A devastating attack on an immigrant delivery worker in Manhattan has resulted in his death months later, police confirmed on Sunday.
Santiago Ajsac Sirin succumbed to injuries sustained in a violent mugging involving multiple assailants. The incident occurred on Second Avenue near East 29th Street in Kips Bay around 5:40 p.m. on July 13.
After the attack, the 36-year-old was taken by medics to Bellevue Hospital, where he remained until he passed away on October 22. The New York Police Department has now classified his death as a homicide, a fact they disclosed on Sunday.
In a heartfelt message on a GoFundMe page set up for Sirin’s widow in Guatemala, a friend described him as “a very hardworking young man who worked as a delivery boy in Manhattan.” The friend continued, “Unfortunately, he was robbed. They tried to take his bicycle and money.”
The same friend expressed a poignant sentiment: “It’s heartbreaking for me, but today it’s me, tomorrow it could be you.”
Prosecutors reported that surveillance footage from a nearby Target store captured the brutal assault. According to a criminal complaint, Sirin was seated on a metal tree guard outside the store when he was attacked by Lavel Boddie, Fritzgens Delia, and two other men who remain at large.
Boddie allegedly punched Asjac Sirin in the face, knocking him back and causing his head to strike the metal tree guard, prosecutors say. Delia then punched him in the head about seven times while Boddie rummaged through the victim’s backpack, prosecutors charge.
Police found Asjac Sirin unconscious, his face swollen and bleeding. Medics took him to Bellevue Hospital, where doctors performed emergency brain surgery. Even after the procedure, he remained in a medically induced coma and was “neurologically unresponsive,” according to the complaint.
Asjac Sirin’s cause of death was blunt force trauma to the back of the head, police sources said.
Four days after the attack, NYPD cops arrested Delia, 32, who lives in a shelter a block from the crime scene. The robbers ran toward that shelter after beating Asjac Sirin and someone recognized Delia from a wanted poster, prosecutors said.
On Aug. 4, a little over two weeks after the attack, cops nabbed Lavel Boddie, also 32. Boddie lives in a shelter in East Flatbush, Brooklyn, according to cops.
Both suspects are charged with assault and attempted robbery and are being held on bail on Rikers Island. Their lawyers could not be reached for comment Sunday.
It’s not yet clear if prosecutors will seek upgraded charges in the wake of Asjac Sirin’s death. A spokesman for the Manhattan D.A.’s office said the investigation is ongoing.
