Francisco Bonilla, a 32-year-old man described in one local report as Hispanic, was killed just after the morning rush began on November 19, 2019, at the busy corner of Pennsylvania and Dumont avenues in Brooklyn. It was the kind of intersection where school drop-offs and commuters overlap—where engines idle, people cross against the light, and the day is supposed to feel routine.
Instead, gunfire cracked through East New York/Brownsville in broad daylight, turning the sidewalk outside a neighborhood bodega into a crime scene.
Police and witnesses described a sudden confrontation—an argument or fight that escalated in seconds. A gun was produced, shots were fired, and Bonilla was hit multiple times in the torso/abdomen. As bystanders scattered, the bullets kept traveling. A mini school bus nearby was struck while carrying a child, and an MTA B20 bus was also hit, its rear door glass damaged; remarkably, no one on either bus was injured. Bonilla was rushed to Brookdale University Hospital where he was pronounced dead.
In the first hours after the shooting, the neighborhood was left with questions and fear. Early reports said there were no immediate arrests and the motive was unclear, even as loved ones gathered near the corner where he fell. Friends and relatives described him as a quiet presence—someone they believed stayed out of trouble—and they spoke of the shock of losing him so close to home. Accounts from the scene said he lived nearby, and his family shared that he had a young daughter, a detail that made the violence feel even more senseless to those standing behind the police tape.
Over time, investigators and prosecutors built a case that centered on surveillance video and forensic evidence. The Brooklyn District Attorney’s Office later said the evidence showed a reputed gang member, Jamel Dossie of Brownsville, had been looking for Bonilla at a bodega he was known to frequent. Video, prosecutors said, captured the moments before, during, and after the shooting—tracking the gunman as he “hunted” Bonilla down and opened fire at the intersection. The same announcement described footage showing the shooter returning to a nearby building afterward, placing a gun into a mailbox, and celebrating in the lobby; a red baseball cap seen on video was later recovered with Dossie’s DNA on it, according to prosecutors.
The case ultimately resulted in a conviction. Prosecutors said Dossie was found guilty by a jury on June 29, 2023, of second-degree murder and second-degree criminal possession of a weapon. On July 26, 2023, he was sentenced in Brooklyn Supreme Court to 25 years to life in prison, a punishment the district attorney said was meant to hold him accountable not only for taking a life but also for endangering children and bus passengers when stray bullets struck both a school bus and an MTA bus.
