On the afternoon of March 25, 2016, 16-year-old Juwan Tavarez, known as Chico, was shot in the head while with friends near the Jefferson Houses on Third Avenue in East Harlem. He was taken to Harlem Hospital in critical condition and remained on life support for two days before dying on March 27, 2016. Reports say he was not believed to be the specific target; the shooting was tied to a dispute between residents of the Jefferson Houses and the nearby Wagner Houses.

Investigators faced challenges early on. Scaffolding outside the Jefferson Houses may have obscured surveillance footage, and police and the family said witnesses were reluctant to come forward. No suspects were immediately arrested, and the case remained unsolved with no public identification of who killed Tavarez.

The killing deeply affected the neighborhood and was followed by the emergence of a group calling themselves the Chico Gang; several members were later indicted in 2019 on charges tied to retaliatory shootings, not for Tavarez’s murder. Does anyone in East Harlem from that time have information that could help bring clarity to who fired the shots on March 25, 2016?