Shemel Mercurius, a 16-year-old female of Guyanese descent, had her life tragically cut short on May 31, 2016, in her East Flatbush, Brooklyn apartment. Shemel had immigrated to the United States from Guyana just four years prior, seeking a better life and aspiring to become a nurse. On that fateful evening, she was babysitting her 3-year-old cousin when a man forced his way into the residence. That man was 24-year-old Taariq Stephens.
After a brief, heated exchange where Stephens reportedly told her, 'Don't ever lie to me,' he shot the teenager with a submachine gun.
First responders arrived at a horrific scene. They found Shemel gravely wounded, slumped over a toy car, and her young cousin covered in her blood. Despite her life-threatening injuries, and in the agonizing twenty-minute wait for an ambulance, Shemel bravely identified her attacker to the police. She managed to tell them that Stephens had been romantically interested in her, but she had rejected his advances. Shemel was rushed to Kings County Hospital, where she succumbed to her injuries approximately 90 minutes after the shooting. Her final words were instrumental in the investigation that followed.
The New York Police Department quickly identified Taariq Stephens as the primary suspect, aided by Shemel's dying declaration and surveillance footage showing him at the apartment building with the weapon. Two days after the shooting, Stephens turned himself in to the authorities. He was subsequently arrested and charged with second-degree murder, criminal possession of a weapon, and endangering the welfare of a child.
During the trial, the prosecution presented the harrowing details of the crime, including the testimony of the officers who heard Shemel's final words. While a jury acquitted Stephens of the top charge of murder, he was convicted of first-degree manslaughter, criminal possession of a weapon, and endangering the welfare of a child. In January 2018, a Brooklyn Supreme Court Justice sentenced Taariq Stephens to 41 years in state prison for his brutal actions, bringing a measure of closure to the devastated family and community of Shemel Mercurius.
