MANHATTAN — An emotionally disturbed man confessed Tuesday to fatally shooting a former teacher in Harlem in August, NYPD officials said.
Abraham Vah, 25, was brought to Beth Israel Tuesday because of his mental state and then started telling hospital staff that he had information about a homicide so they called police, an NYPD spokesman said.
Van, who's been arrested 11 times since 2014, started making incriminating statements to police, saying he was the gunman who fatally shot Odessa Simms, a 61-year-old former teacher, in Colonel Young Playground about 11:44 p.m. Aug. 20, 2016, police said.
Simms, who lived nearby and had a son and daughter, was among 70 people in the park at the time of the shooting, and was not the intended target, police and friends said at the time. Police could not immediately say on Wednesday what sparked the shooting. Simms was shot in the neck and was pronounced dead at Harlem Hospital.
Vah, of Cambria Heights, was arrested Tuesday and expected to be arraigned on charges of murder, criminal use of a firearm and criminal possession of a weapon, police said.
His criminal history stretches back to 2014, but most of those records are sealed, an NYPD spokesman said.
He was arrested that year for having marijuana, possession of a forged instrument, driving with suspended license and having a license violation, police said.
