INWOOD — A wanted Bronx murder suspect forced a driver to chauffeur him around at gunpoint before robbing and shooting another man on New Year’s Eve, police said.
Ruben Pizzaro a.k.a Chullo, 23, went on the crime spree more than a month after police first sought him for the Nov. 24 murder of David Rivera in Tremont, according to the NYPD.
Pizzaro is accused of shooting the 24-year-old Rivera in the groin, torso, thigh and arm during an argument near Crotona Park around 9:15 a.m., police said.
More than a month later Pizzaro jumped into a parked Ford van at 54 Sherman St. and ordered the 22-year-old driver to take him to Ellwood Street — less than a quarter-mile away — at 11 a.m. on Dec. 31, police said. He then took the man's driver’s license, jacket and debit card and told him to wait.
Pizzaro walked up to a 29-year-old man standing outside 61 Ellwood St., demanded he hand over his book bag containing a Playstation 4 and shot him in the shoulder, police said.
Pizzaro grabbed the backpack, ran to the waiting van and ordered the driver take him to an undisclosed location in The Bronx, where Pizzaro got out, police said.
The 29-year-old shooting victim was taken to Harlem Hospital in stable condition, police said. The driver was unharmed.
Police said the murder and the New Year’s Eve shooting are unrelated.
Pizzaro has been arrested multiple times before, including once in 2013 for reckless endangerment, police said.
He is a 6-foot, 2-inch tall man weighing 160 pounds, police said.
Anyone with information about Pizzaro’s whereabouts is asked to call the NYPD's Crime Stoppers Hotline at 800-577-TIPS.
