Girlfriend recounts final moments of Queens man fatally stabbed outside Jackson Heights apartment
Steven Shimabuku, 25, died after he was attacked outside of his apartment on 90th St. in Jackson Heights on Friday night, according to the NYPD. Despite being stabbed in the chest, he managed to stagger into his apartment, where his girlfriend, Mirna Zumba, tried in vain to help him before he lost consciousness.
NEW YORK DAILY NEWS
Saturday, December 20, 2014, 8:15 AM
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FACEBOOKSteven Shimabuku, 25, died after he was attacked outside of his apartment Friday, police said.
A young father from Queens was fatally stabbed near his home Friday night — but managed to make it back into his apartment before collapsing in front of his girlfriend.
“He had just come home from getting a hair cut and he went back outside,” Mirna Zumba, 26, said of her boyfriend, Steven Shimabuku, 25. “The next thing I know, he’s running back inside.”
He had been stabbed in the chest, cops said.
“I tried to help him and he told me to call 911. I saw him bleeding and he just said ‘Call 911,’” she told the Daily News Saturday morning.
“I asked: ‘Who did this to you? Who did this to you?’ But he couldn’t say anything. He couldn’t talk.”
Speaking in the basement apartment in Jackson Heights that they shared, Zumba was in tears, shaking her head and wrapping her arms about her midsection as if to hug herself.
Shimabuku was attacked just steps from the apartment on 90th St. near 37th Ave. about 9:15 p.m., police said.
He was en route to a local store, cops said, but Zumba told The News she did not know why her boyfriend went back outside.
“I don’t know what happened in just those few minutes; it was just a few minutes,” she said. “A neighbor bumped into him \[before the attack\] and he told me Steven was alone. I asked: ‘Was he fighting with anyone?’ He said no.”
Emergency responders rushed Shimabuku to Elmhurst Hospital Center, where he died.
Shimabuku worked as a plumber and was raising a 3-year-old son, Isaiah, his girlfriend said. He was also helping raise his Zumba’s 4-year-old daughter.
“She called him dad because that’s what he was to her,” Zumba said of her daughter. “He loved her. They played together. He was good to her.”
“Steven was a happy person,” she added. “He loved to make people laugh. He always had a smile on his face.”
Zumba said her boyfriend was not involved in anything that she knew of that could have lead to his killing. She wondered if it was a case of mistaken identity.
“I just don’t believe it,” she said, noting that Shimabuku’s family was in shock.
“They’re in disbelief. They’re saying: ‘It’s not true.’”
Shimabuku’s killing was one of two unrelated stabbings in Queens is less than two hours on Friday night.
In the other incident, a 23-year-old man was critically injured in Astoria, police said. The victim, who was not immediately identified, approached his attacker and started arguing with him on Ditmars Ave. near 35th St. around 10:35 p.m., cops said.
His assailant stabbed him three times in the back before jumping in a car and speeding away.
The victim was also taken to Elmhurst Hospital Center, where he was listed in critical condition, officials said.
No arrests have been made in either stabbing.
