Family suspects stray bullet in hard-working Bronx dad’s playground drive-by slay

A hard-working father of twins was shot dead after sitting down for some fresh air in a Bronx playground — and his grief-stricken family believes a stray bullet ended his life.

Miguel Cruz had just picked up his ailing mom and his 4-year-old niece Friday evening and brought them back to his mom’s apartment on Sedgwick Ave. near Bridge Park, where Cruz also was living, when he headed downstairs to the playground outside.

The choice proved tragic — a killer on a scooter sped by and started shooting about 6:30 p.m. and one of the bullets struck him in the neck just minutes after his sister last spoke to him.

Cruz had his back to the street when he was shot, according to the heartbroken sister, Camillia Andrades.

“He didn’t even see it coming,” said Andrades, 32. “I’m still trying to figure out why. My brother don’t argue with anyone. He was literally an innocent bystander. I could bet my bottom dollar. I could bet my life on it. It was never meant for him. It could not have been.”

Cruz, 47, died at St. Barnabas Hospital, becoming the 18th homicide victim this year in the Bronx’s 46th Precinct — which has seen more murders this year than any other precinct in the five boroughs.

Cruz, the oldest of three siblings and the father of adult twin daughters, worked for a decade and a half at Lehman College before taking a job at Phelps Hospital in Sleepy Hollow, his family recounted.

Andrades described him as a devoted family man, and explained how his love for his kin guided him even in the last moments of his life.

“My mom was babysitting my daughter but she had got sick. They were out,” Andrades said. So she called Cruz and asked him to go get them, near Fordham University.

Their mother had a stomach bug and Cruz hustled to pick them up and return them to his mom’s 15th-floor apartment.

“He called me, he said, ‘Mommy’s okay. I got her upstairs. She’s good,’” Andrades recalled. He spent some time with the little girl in the park outside then took her upstairs to watch television.

Andrades, who lives upstate,  arrived at her mother’s home about 5 p.m.

“He was inside when I got here. He was telling me about my mom. ‘She’s so sick. I feel so sorry for her,’” Andrades recalled.

Cruz wanted to go back to the park, to spend time outside and to chat with a cousin, so Andrades went downstairs with him.

“I hate talking about this,” Andrades said, breaking down in tears. “We walked down. We walked up the block laughing and joking. He was sitting on the bench. Not sitting regular, but sitting on the back part, you know, where you have your feet on the seat.”

After a few minutes, Andrades, her husband, her son and her daughter all got into their car to leave.

“I grabbed my kids. I gave my brother a hug, I told him I loved him. He told me he loved me. I said, ‘I’ll see you tomorrow.’ I got in my car,” she said.

She had been driving for just a few minutes when she got the awful news from her other brother, who had just returned to the building with soup for their sick mom.

“I got to Burnside Avenue and my other brother was calling me saying he got shot and he was dead,” Andrades said.

She frantically tried to get back to the park but the traffic was too heavy. By the time she returned Cruz had already been rushed to the hospital.

“My cousin was sitting with him,” Andrades said. “He said he heard the shots. He said it sounded so close that he thought he got hit. So he was in shock. And everybody started running.”

Her other brother returned with the soup in time to witness paramedics trying to save Cruz.

“He said they was pumping his chest but he knew he was gone from his hand, because he looked at his hand,” Andrades said. “You could tell he didn’t have blood circulating in his hand anymore. His hand was pale. He wasn’t moving. And they was trying for so long.”

An NYPD spokesman couldn’t say Sunday whether or not Cruz was the intended target. The victim had no apparent criminal record, police sources said.

The mother of his two daughters, who identified herself as Sandra, blamed his death on increasing crime in the neighborhood.

“Something needs to be done with this gun violence. It’s unfair. He wasn’t somebody that was in the mix. He wasn’t in the streets or anything,” she said. “It just happened that he wanted to get some fresh air for a little bit before going back upstairs. It’s not fair that he was taken away not only from his daughters but everyone that loved him.”

Even as killings have decreased citywide and in the Bronx, murders have more than doubled in the 46th Precinct this year, with 17 through July 28 compared to seven in the same timeframe last year.

The precinct, which covers Fordham, University Heights, Morris Heights and Mount Hope, accounts for more than a quarter of the 64 murders in the Bronx this year. The Bronx is covered by 12 NYPD precincts.

Sandra, 44, described Cruz as a devoted father who “lived to provide for (his daughters) and to make sure that everything was OK.”

Now they’re left with asking for donations on GoFundMe to make ends meet.

“He was a great father. Great friend. He loved his siblings, his cousins. Everybody loved him because he was the one in the family that literally made sure that he had a household,” Sandra said.

“Everybody respected him. Everybody looked toward him, asked him for guidance because he wasn’t in the streets. He was working and doing the right thing. He’s the one that people looked to and said, ‘Man, he’s doing it. He’s struggling but he’s doing it.’”

Sandra said he made an impact at the hospital where he worked in environmental services.

“Everyone knew who this man was — patients, employees, administrators. He was such an outgoing person. Loving, caring,” she said. “He would help anyone in any moment. You didn’t have to ask twice for his assistance.”

Cruz went to the gym every day and made regular weekend trips to Jones Beach with his family. He’d record those trips, and the other milestones in his life, in a journal, his family and friends said.

“He had this little book,” said family friend Samantha Gonzalez, 27. “He had a list dedicated to his family, writing a lot of positive notes and affirmations. Taking vacations with his family.”

Cruz’s sister also knew of the journal.

“Everybody journals differently,” Andrares said. “He was like doing sketches and writing little affirmations, prayers, things to do. Everything was so positive.”

“He was just a great person all around,” she added. “Nobody could hate him. He’s funny. He makes jokes. As soon as you see him, you look at his face, you gonna laugh. He has that energy. He’s just such a great person…. We weren’t prepared for this. No one was prepared for this.”