A Far Rockaway family is looking for answers after police responded to a call about a dispute at their apartment and shot and killed their 26-year-old son earlier this week.
Police said they received an anonymous 911 call at 10:34 a.m. on Monday reporting trouble at the fourth-floor apartment, where Geoffrey Parris, 26, and his brother A.J. Parris, 30, were allegedly having a “dispute.”
Some minutes after arriving, officers entered a bedroom and saw Geoffrey Parris reaching for what turned out to be a fake gun, according to NYPD officials. They shot him several times, and he was pronounced dead about an hour later.
Police and family members said neither Geoffrey nor A.J. Parris had a criminal record or documented history of mental illness, and A.J. Parris has not been charged with a crime. A third brother, Machel Lynch, said he’d never known the two to have a physical fight.
As the state attorney general’s office begins its review of the shooting, the family is still struggling to understand what led to Geoffrey Parris' killing, including why police were called, why he had a fake gun and why he was taken to a hospital more than 30 minutes away.
Geoffrey Parris is the second person to be shot and killed by police at the Ocean Bay Apartment complex since 2022.
The city’s medical examiner determined Geoffrey Parris' death was a homicide caused by “gunshot wounds to the torso and lower extremities,” according to spokesperson Julie Bolcer, who added that police shot him four times.
Attorney General Letitia James' office will investigate the shooting, as required by state law. The NYPD has footage from the officers' body-worn cameras but declined to release it or let Gothamist view it.
Police said when they first arrived at the apartment, officers spoke to A.J. Parris, who answered the door. They then entered the apartment and knocked on Geoffrey Parris' bedroom door, according to Tarik Sheppard, the NYPD's deputy commissioner of public information.
Sheppard said the officers spoke to Geoffrey Parris through the door for two to three minutes and asked him to come out. The exchange was filmed on the officers’ body cameras, but the recording was muffled and inaudible, he said.
According to police, the officers then opened the bedroom door and saw Geoffrey Parris reach for a gun, which was later determined to be fake. Police said the officer instructed him to “drop the gun,” then shot him “multiple times.”
“This is a clear, cut and dry shooting,” Sheppard said. “There’s nothing the officers did wrong.”
An undated photo of Geoffrey Parris, right, with his grandmother.
Sheppard declined to say how many times officers shot at Geoffrey. He also declined to give a reason for why he declined.
A discrepancy in the NYPD’s account of the shooting is over officers responding to a report of “shots fired.” Gothamist obtained 911 call logs for that day and found the report came after the officers arrived at the apartment.
Lynch said he believes the caller was a neighbor who heard police shoot Geoffrey Parris. The police department declined to answer questions about any earlier call for service or why officers came to the apartment.
On Tuesday morning, while most of the city was shoveling snow, Lamont Davis carefully mopped a trail of blood lining the hallway inside the apartment building. Davis, who works in the building, said he was in the lobby when he saw emergency responders carry Geoffrey Parris out on Monday.
“There was no movement, just a sheet over a body,” he said. “His soul was already gone.”
Geoffrey Parris was pronounced dead just over an hour after the officers arrived at the apartment, according to police.
Quayshawn Samuel was also killed at the Ocean Bay Apartment complex in December 2022, and the state attorney general found after an investigation that the police officer who shot him did not break the law.
NYPD officers shot and killed 13 people in 2022, according to the NYPD’s most recent use of force report.
Geoffrey Parris' extended family trickled in and out of the apartment on Tuesday evening. Some carried in hot food, while others carried out bags filled with his belongings.
Lynch spent the evening looking through his brother's hand-drawn art and old photos. “He cut off his braids and shaved his head when our grandma lost her hair to cancer,” Lynch said, holding up a photo of Geoffrey Parris and his grandmother wearing colorful sweaters.
“He just had a job interview and now we’re sitting here cleaning his room with blood all over the place,” he said. “It just don’t make no sense to me.”
“I keep telling A.J., ‘it’s not your fault, it’s not your fault,’” Lynch added.
Police declined to provide a detailed account of what happened on Monday, pointing to an NYPD Force Investigation Division review that's underway.
Lynch said that on Tuesday he also looked through a bullet hole left in his brother’s window.
“Everyone dies," he said. "But this was my baby brother. I never thought it would happen like this.”
