Meto Kolar, 17, was…
By Dustin Brown
A bullet fired from a car in Ridgewood struck a Grover Cleveland High School student in the abdomen Monday afternoon after he and a group of friends apparently got caught up in a verbal altercation with the shooter, police said.
Meto Kolar, 17, was listed in stable condition Tuesday afternoon at Elmhurst Hospital Center, where he was expected to remain in recovery for about five days, a hospital spokeswoman said.
Kolar had been standing with a group of teenagers at the corner of Tonsor and Harmon streets around 2:25 p.m. Monday when two or three shots were fired into the crowd from a gray Nissan Maxima across the street, police said.
Kolar was struck by a bullet in the lower right abdomen, then ran for two blocks until he collapsed on Forest Avenue by Greene Avenue in the doorway alcove of a three-family home on which holiday decorations were still strung from the third-story balcony.
Amy Huang, 33, said she stepped out of her apartment to find Kolar sprawled face-up in front of her door, where police were aiding him until the ambulance arrived.
“I’m so scared for the kids. Why do the kids do that?” Huang said.
Hours after he was removed by an ambulance, a pile of white napkins Meto had used to cover the wound still sat in the doorway, stained with a nickel-sized splotch of blood.
Capt. Michael Merritt, the second in command at the 104th Precinct, said he believes the shooting was provoked by a verbal dispute between the teens on the corner and two or more men who sat in the car.
“We think it was just a confrontation over nothing,” Merritt said, describing the dispute as a “What are you looking at?” battle of wills. “It escalated from there,” he said.
Kolar was not bleeding heavily from the wound, Merritt said, and doctors at Elmhurst were able to remove the bullet in surgery.
The shooting happened only two blocks from Grover Cleveland HS, where Kolar is a student.
Not many students were walking the streets in the frigid hours following the shooting, but a few said they could not remember any other instances when a conflict resulted in gunfire.
“There’ve been fights but not shootings or anything like this,” said Klaudio Luka, 17, who lives down the block from the shooting site. “All I’ve seen was really just beating kids, jumping kids — never shootings. My dad’s gonna keep me locked in.”
Reach reporter Dustin Brown by e-mail at Timesledger@aol.com or call 229-0300, Ext. 154.
