A New York City postal worker is being remembered as an “honorable man” who “took care of his family” after a woman allegedly fatally stabbed him inside a Harlem deli this week.
Jaia Cruz, 24, was arrested and charged with first-degree murder on Thursday, Jan. 2, after police were called to Lenox Avenue in Harlem — between 118th and 119th Streets — around 2:38 p.m. local time. After arriving at the scene, New York Police Department (NYPD) officers discovered a man with “multiple stab wounds.”
The man, later identified as 36-year-old Bronx resident Ray Hodges, was transported via ambulance to NYC Health + Hospitals/Harlem, where he was pronounced dead.
Cruz, a Harlem resident, was arrested later that same day.
According to the Associated Press, NBC News and CBS News New York, the United States Postal Service (USPS) has confirmed that the victim was a letter carrier assigned to Manhattan.
“The Postal Inspection Service takes matters involving the safety and wellbeing of postal service employees as a top priority. We are working diligently with the New York City Police Department on this investigation,” the USPS said in a statement to NBC News and CBS News New York.
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Hodges was stabbed in the chest, neck and arms at the Harlem deli and was found by police on the floor in his uniform, per a court complaint obtained by the AP.
At the time of the crime, Hodges was ordering a sandwich when a female customer at the counter began arguing with him about whose turn it was to order. She then allegedly pulled out a knife and stabbed the postal worker, a deli worker told CBS News New York.
Janet Rich, a customer at the deli, told The New York Daily News that the stabbing was “over a sandwich” and that she tried to intervene along with another person when the pair began to argue over who was first in line.
A sandwich maker told the outlet, and The New York Post, that the suspect stepped in front of the victim in line, before a dispute led to her allegedly spitting in his face, him throwing a plastic bottle and her pulling the knife.
After the stabbing, the suspect allegedly fled to her Harlem apartment before being arrested, per both outlets. It was not immediately clear if Cruz has retained an attorney.
Now, community members are mourning the loss of Hodges, whose brother described him as a “great person,” telling the Daily News, “He was an honorable man. He took care of his family and everybody.”
Alejandro Alarcon, who told the Post that Hodges delivers his mail, remembered him as being “real nice” and going out of his way for locals. Longtime friend Flip Morales told the Daily News that Hodges was an “amazing person” and a “great father,” who “was always a working man.”
“It’s just messed up that the family gotta go through this,” Morales said. “He was trying to just make some money. That’s it. Just getting up doing what you gotta do to provide for his kids and his family, and things like this [happen].”
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