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Most everyone is well aware at this time of the shooting at a deli on Coles between Sixth and Seventh Streets. Below you’ll find a press release from the HPNA regarding information for the candlelight vigil to be held this Friday at 7pm in Hamilton Park.

Also below are links to a WABC video report that aired last night, and some relevant newspaper articles.

P R E S S R E L E A S E – H P N A

12:00 noon January 28, 2009 – For Immediate Release
Contact: Hamilton Park Neighborhood Association
Olu Howard, President
917-855-2212 or [email protected]

On January 27th 2009, the Hamilton Park neighborhood of Jersey City lost a vivacious community member to a violent and senseless criminal act. Mr. Kirik Parikh was shot and killed while doing what he did almost every morning –
pouring coffee and selling newspapers at their family-run deli. The Parikh’s store at the corner of 7th and Coles Street was a welcoming place for not only the residents of this quiet brownstone neighborhood, but also for the students and staff of McNair High School, located just across the street. Unfortunately, this horrific act of violence comes on the tails of the Hamilton Park Neighborhood Association (HPNA) making recent complaints to local police about increased criminal activity in the area and neighbor concerns regarding safety and police responsiveness.

In the wake of this awful tragedy, the HPNA invites the entire downtown community, neighbors, businesses, students and workers to gather together at a candlelight vigil in memory of Mr. Parikh. We will gather at the Hamilton Park gazebo on Friday, January 30th at 7pm. Jersey City Mayor Jerramiah Healy, Freeholder Eliu Rivera, and Ward E Councilman Steven Fulop are invited to speak, as well as any neighbors or friends who may have a few words to share.

We will then walk to Mr. Parikh’s store in remembrance of his fine character. He was a good neighbor to all of us and will be sorely missed. Fund information for donations to his family will be available at the vigil.

WABC Video Report 1

WABC Video Report 2

MURDERED IN A.M. ROBBERY AT DELI
Popular Downtown merchant shot after threatening to call the police

Wednesday, January 28, 2009
By MICHAELANGELO CONTE
JOURNAL STAFF WRITER

A popular owner of a Downtown Jersey City grocery store was gunned down at his business yesterday morning after arguing with the shooter in a failed but deadly robbery attempt, officials said.

“This was clearly a gratuitous act of gun violence taking the life of the hard-working gentleman,” said Hudson County Prosecutor Edward DeFazio of the death of Kiritkumar Parikh, 57, of Van Winkle Avenue, inside his Albert’s Grocery at Coles and Seventh streets.

At about 9:50 a.m. the gunman entered the store and after a short time approached Parikh at the counter, took out a semiautomatic handgun and demanded money, DeFazio said.

When Parikh, who was there with his wife, refused to comply and said he would call the police, the man fired two rounds, one of them fatally wounding the shop owner in the left upper torso, officials said.

The gunman ran from the store without taking anything, DeFazio said.

The wife, who speaks little English, called her daughter instead of police, but a customer who walked in on the bloody scene dialed 911, he said. Police haven’t determined if the robber fled on foot or in a vehicle, but investigators are reviewing security video, DeFazio said.

Family members arrived shortly after police. Filled with disbelief and grief, they cried in the middle of Coles Street.

Police escorted them first to a nearby laundromat and then to McNair Academic High School, across the street from the store.

Robin Daniels, who was doing wash at the laundromat yesterday, called Parikh “a neighborhood guy.”

“He looked out for everybody,” Daniels said. “It’s just shocking. He was the kind of guy that when you bought a lottery ticket, he said, ‘Good Luck.'”

Zoima Moya rushed to the scene when she heard of the shooting and was in the laundromat when family members came in.

“They were crying and upset,” Moya said. “This is very upsetting because this is a nice man, a nice family.”

At about noon, staff from the state Regional Medical Examiners Office arrived and Parikh’s body was loaded into a van. With a police escort, family members followed the van to the medical examiner’s office in Newark.

At about 3 p.m. the victim’s two daughters, both in their 20s, and some other family members, returned to the store and retrieved a few items from behind the counter.

The suspect is described as an African-American, around 6-feet-tall, of thin build and wearing dark clothing, DeFazio said.

Anyone with information about the killing is asked to call the Hudson County Prosecutor’s Office’s Homicide Squad at (201) 915-1345.
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Mourning deli owner who knew them well
Wednesday, January 28, 2009

McNair Academic High School was locked down yesterday to keep students out of the way as police investigated the killing of a store owner who sold them sandwiches, sodas and snacks.

“I feel like it’s a disgrace,” said 12th-grader Manuel Malcampo of the fatal shooting of Kiritkumar Parikh, 57, of Van Winkle Avenue, inside his deli at Coles and Seventh streets. “It’s a very senseless act and it makes you feel unsafe even in a community like this. Everyone is discussing it and the teachers feel really bad about it.”

Manuel said school officials informed the students over the public address system.

“I never thought something like this would happen here,” said 11th-grader Peter Habib. “The students are confused and upset and just devastated.”

Parikh knew the students so well that he’d place what they wanted on the counter seconds after they walked in, Peter said. Ninth-grader Gina Dayawon shopped at the store almost every day.

“The couple was so adorable,” Gina said. “The students are all wondering what reason would you have to do that to them.”

MICHAELANGELO CONTE