Woman, 72, struck by apparent stray bullet in Queens home on Memorial Day
A Queens grandmother was struck by a stray bullet in her home late Memorial Day – and told The Post in an exclusive phone interview Tuesday morning that her COVID-stricken husband’s earlier bathroom mishap may have saved her life.
Retired librarian Margaret Henry, 72, was sitting in a chair inside the home on 128th Street near 107th Avenue in South Ozone Park around 11:30 p.m. when a black sedan pulled up, and someone inside fired multiple times through a living room window, the sources said.
The elderly woman was struck in the upper right arm, cops said.
“When I heard the shooting, I must have picked up my hand, because the bullet went into my arm and out and didn’t penetrate my bone,” Henry said. “It just went right through where I was sitting.”
“They told me I must have lifted up my hand when I heard the bullet,” she added. “They were firing a lot. It must have been more than one person firing, because there [were] a lot of shots. I couldn’t count, but it was a lot. I know I never heard anything like this on my block before.”
Henry said she was watching “Dead Presidents” — the 1995 crime film that she claims was filmed in her home — when a shot flew through her window and struck her.
“I had watched it so many times before,” she said. “I was just sitting there with the TV on, and that movie was playing and the bullets started flying through the living room.”
She said she had just gotten home from the hospital, where her husband, Gersham Henry — who simply goes by “Henry” — was taken with COVID, when she was shot.
Before her husband went to the hospital, he had urinated all over a chair due to incontinence, she said.
Henry said she was sitting there briefly before she realized her husband had wet the chair. She moved to a different chair — a decision that may have saved her life.
“God is good to me,” she said. “I would have gotten shot in the head and the chest and all over because that chair was out in the middle, and it got all kinds of shot up. If he was sitting there, he would definitely be dead. He would have gotten shot in the head, in the chest and all over. It was about 15 minutes [from the time] I came home from the hospital till the time the shooting started.”
“Henry saved me by peeing up the chair!”
The septuagenarian was taken to Jamaica Hospital Medical Center with non-life-threatening injuries.
Henry, who learned that she has COVID as well, is a mother of five with seven grandchildren. The family is from Antigua.
She is a former library supervisor who retired in 2019 from the Queens Public Library on Merrick Boulevard, where she worked for 27 years.
Now Henry’s children are insisting that she move out, after living in the same home for 30 years.
“It is not a question!” said her son, Lynroy Henry, 55. “She is not going to be living here. We were already concerned because of her leg issues. You can see she walks with a cane. We all have our own houses, so she has many choices. She can be with any of us.
When asked whether she wants to move, Henry acknowledged she is “afraid” and said, “I don’t know.”
Lynroy Henry added that his father, who is still in the hospital, does not know what happened to his mother.
“My father does not know she was shot,” he said. “Because of COVID, we can not see him and he does not have a phone in the hospital. They told us he is stable. That is all we know.”
Investigators do not believe she was the intended target, according to the sources.
They are probing whether the shooter targeted the wrong house, or whether the gunfire was intended for someone known to the victim, the sources said.
Police are also probing whether the gunplay was gang-related, the sources said.
Sixteen shell casings were recovered at the scene, according to the sources.
Multiple bullet holes could be seen on the facade of the home Tuesday morning.
Bullets also riddled the freezer in the home.
“I don’t know what to say. It’s really getting bad,” Henry said of the recent gun violence in the area. “The neighbors will tell you, I’m very peaceful. I don’t bother nobody. So I don’t know why they target my house.”
“They’re wicked people, because look!” she said, pointing to the bullet holes in the window. “There is a lot of wickedness going on. My hand was bloody! I was bleeding a lot! I went to the hospital with nothing on top. They wanted to cut everything off.”
A 22-year-old neighbor who asked that his name not be used acknowledged that “this ain’t out of the ordinary around here!”
“This is regular,” he said. “It’s always raining bullets here. It’s crazy!”
