WILLIAMSBURG — The family of the two brothers stabbed — one fatally — after an early Sunday morning soccer match is struggling to pay funeral and hospital costs in the wake of the violence, a family friend said.
A Gofundme campaign, launched by the brothers' soccer buddy Fernando Simon, 33, has collected $1,600 so far to help bury Delvin Martinez, 31, and pay doctor bills for his brother Oscar Martinez, 29.
The brothers were both stabbed multiple times by an unidentified attacker from the opposing soccer team after late night game at the Juan Morel Campus Secondary School at 215 Heyward St, according to police. No arrests had been made as of Tuesday, police confirmed.
The pair finished up their game around 2 a.m. and the two teams started to argue, and the dispute soon turned physical, police said. In the fight, the brothers were both stabbed. Delvin was cut in the throat and torso and died soon after. Ocsar, who also had stab wounds on his throat, torso and face, was left in critical condition.
"Today, he started speaking a little," Simon, who had been in and out of the hospital since the attack acting as a translator for the boys' mother who speaks little English, said Monday afternoon. The family hails from Honduras. Though Simon wasn't at the game, he'd spent the whole night with the family and seen the bad shape Oscar was in.
"He looked really bad, really bad. He was looking like he was dead, he wasn't breathing he had a tube down his throat, a machine next to him that was basically breathing for him," he said. "It was horrible."
While Oscar's condition now seems more stable, Simon still mourns the loss of his friend, Delvin, who teammates had dubbed "Lobo," partly because he was hairy, but mostly because of his stealthy moves on the soccer field.
"He was a good finisher, as a player myself, very few of us can turn around and shoot and score with precision," he said. "He was very good at that. A very good striker, one of the best strikers."
Delvin, who lived in Flatbush after recently leaving his mother's East Williamsburg home, leaves behind a girlfriend and a 6-month-old boy. While the tot wasn't Delvin's child by blood, he had gleefully stepped up to the role of father, Simon said.
"He was like, 'I want to be a father,' he was basically raising him as his own," Simon said.
Two days after the attack, Simon said players were struggling to understand what happened. They often switch teams so there's no sense of intense rivalry, he said.
"After every argument, every type of player knows, it stays on the field." he said. "It's a contact sport, it's very aggressive sometimes, but nothing malicious, nothing to kill someone, absolutely not."
"That's why it's just very upsetting, we still can't believe it," he said. "We're in shock."
