On the night of December 26, 2023, Clarisa Burgos, a 28-year-old mother from Brooklyn, was fatally shot in the head while sitting in the passenger seat of a black Honda sedan in the Richmond Hill neighborhood of Queens, New York. The driver of the vehicle, a 39-year-old man, was also shot multiple times but managed to drive to the 103rd Precinct station house to seek help.
Burgos was pronounced dead at the scene, while the driver was transported to a hospital in stable condition.
The attack was captured on surveillance video, which showed three assailants approaching the parked car near 127th Street and Liberty Avenue and opening fire. The gunmen fired numerous rounds into the vehicle before fleeing the scene. Investigators recovered 16 shell casings from the location.
It was later revealed that the shooting was a tragically misdirected murder-for-hire plot. The intended target was the 39-year-old driver of the car, who was Burgos's boyfriend. Federal prosecutors announced that the mastermind behind the attempted assassination was Dajahn 'Jeezy Mula' McBean, a 29-year-old gang leader who was incarcerated at the time. McBean allegedly orchestrated the hit from his jail cell using a contraband cellphone following a social media dispute with the intended victim.
Authorities charged McBean, along with Karl 'Pacavell' Smith, 26, and Chelsey 'Ms. Chinn' Harris, 23, in connection with the crime. Prosecutors stated that Smith and Harris helped to lure the intended target to the location of the ambush. This was reportedly the second attempt on the man's life, with a previous shooting occurring just two days earlier outside another Queens nightclub. In July 2025, both Karl Smith and Chelsey Harris pleaded guilty to their roles in the shooting that resulted in the death of Clarisa Burgos. Another individual, Julissa Bartholomew, was also charged in the case.
