A 9-year-old girl in Brooklyn hid in the closet while her father murdered her mother, two sisters and later himself on her birthday. She was then gifted a trip to Disney World by the NYPD detectives who worked on her case and who helped raise money to fund the trip.
The girl was at home with her mother and two older half-sisters in an apartment in Brownsville when her father, Joseph McCrimons, shot them to death and then committed suicide.
The girl bravely called 9-1-1 to alert them to the shooting, and when police arrived, they found the bodies of the three women and the father dead in a nearby walkway with a gunshot wound to the head. The girl was not injured.
“Daddy was coming over for my birthday, and he shot people,” the girl told a 9-1-1 operator, NYPD Chief of Detectives James Essig said.
“She was weeping and crying [that she] ‘didn’t have presents.’ It was heartbreaking to hear that. We found her hidden in a closet,” Essig told the New York Post.
According to sources, the shooting arose from a domestic dispute between the father and mother.
The responding officers from the Brooklyn North Homicide Squad were so heartbroken by the girl’s experience they raised several thousand dollars to send her to Disney World with relatives, the Detectives Endowment Association said.
Detectives John Bartek, Erick Parks and Jean Louis of the Brooklyn North Homicide Squad along with Detectives Trevor White and Rene Orrego of the 73 precinct and Det. Felicia Richards of PSA #2 helped with the fundraising drive and were later honored by the DEA.
The DEA did not specify the exact amount of money raised, but said it was enough to send the kid’s aunt, uncle, two cousins and grandma to accompany her for the trip. JetBlue also agreed to contribute the plane tickets.
In addition to the Disney World passes, the officers also gave the girl an American Girl doll and a mini-shield – a certificate making her an honorary detective – along with other DEA regalia. They also gave a few items to the girl’s young cousins and her aunt and uncle, who are now taking care of her.
