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Worker Fatally Stabbed at Inwood Barber Shop, Police Say

By  Trevor Kapp and Aidan Gardiner | November 16, 2015 8:05am 

 Michael Hernandez, inset, was fatally stabbed by Danilo Lora, police said.
Michael Hernandez, inset, was fatally stabbed by Danilo Lora, police said.
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DNAinfo/Trevor Kapp and Instagram/money_mike_2500

MANHATTAN — An Inwood barber was fatally stabbed during a fight at his shop Sunday night, police said.

Michael Hernandez, a 26-year-old father to a young girl, was at the West 207th Street barber shop, near Vermilyea Avenue, about 9:55 p.m. when he and another man got into an argument that spilled outside, police and witnesses said.

The other man, 59-year-old Danilo Lora, stabbed Hernandez and fled, an NYPD spokesman said. It's unknown if the suspect was a customer.

Hernandez, who lived nearby on West 213th Street, was pronounced dead at Harlem Hospital, police said.

Lora, who lives on West 178th Street in Washington Heights, was arrested in The Bronx on charges of murder and criminal possession of a weapon, police said.

Lora has been arrested six times before, an NYPD spokesman said.

Colleagues remembered Hernandez, who has a daughter in Puerto Rico, as a talented barber.

"He was a good, good barber. He was good with beards and color. He'd even cut his own hair nice," said Richard Martinez, 45, who worked in the shop with Hernandez.

Friends agreed.

"He was a very good, very nice guy. He was one of the best barbers," said a friend, Mike Alla, 26.

"I'm just hoping this is just a dream, a nightmare. I just want to wake up," Alla said.

Friends said Hernandez wasn't quick to violence.

"If someone had a problem with him, he'd talk it out with them instead of trying to fight. He wasn't a fighter," Alla said.

Hernandez' colleagues said he was having a good day up until the stabbing.

"He was in a good mood. Sometimes he was hyper and made everyone nervous, but yesterday he was normal. Then this happens. I feel sory," Martinez said.