Story last updated on July 22, at 3 p.m.
Officers discovered a young man lying in the street after he was shot in Huntington Station on Saturday night, July 18.
Suffolk County police responded to a call shortly after 8 p.m. on 11th Avenue, across from Clifford Court, where they found Luis Hernandez with a gunshot wound in his leg.
Police said Hernandez was standing in the street in front of his house when he was shot, and the shooter’s identity is still unknown. Police said Hernandez was in stable condition at Huntington Hospital.
However, Alexandra Zendrian, director of public relations for North Shore-LIJ Health System, said on Tuesday in a phone interview that no one by the name of Luis Hernandez was in their directory.
Attempts to contact Hernandez this week were unsuccessful.
The shooting happened mere blocks from Huntington Manor Fire Department’s annual fireman’s fair, where many residents of Huntington Station were enjoying a fireworks show.
“Another one of our children [is] being wounded, what is it going to take to stop this?” June Margolin, a founder of Huntington Matters Neighborhood Watch said on Monday. Huntington Matters Neighborhood Watch was founded in 2014 due to the number of young casualties the community had suffered in the past two years.
The organization aims to unite citizens and law enforcement to deter crime and make the community safer.
The Huntington Station community is still feeling the effects of violence against its youth. On Thursday, July 16, friends and family of 18-year-old Maggie Rosales, 25-year-old Danny Carbajal and 23-year-old Sarah Strobel gathered at Depot Road Park for a memorial ceremony dedicated to the three Huntington Station youths that fell victim to crimes over the last two years.
Rosales was found stabbed to death, on Lynch Street in Huntington Station last October. Carbajal was shot in the head in July 2014 outside his Huntington Station home. Strobel’s body was found off the side of a path in Froehlich Farm Nature Preserve in October 2013.
While police have charged Adam Saalfield of Huntington Station with Rosales’ murder, the other two victims have not yet seen justice, which is currently the same situation Hernandez is in.
“The police are working harder with us and I am looking forward to the new inspector at the 2nd Precinct, I hope there will be new ways to address this problem,” Margolin said. “But to me it doesn’t seem like this issue is slowing down.”
