By Courtney Dentch
A Hollis woman was suffocated and a Jamaica man was shot in separate murders just blocks away from each other Sunday, police said.
Shakesha Patterson, 29, was killed in an apparent fight with her live-in boyfriend in her home at 109-36 205th St., about five blocks away from Club Crystal at Jamaica Avenue and Francis Lewis Boulevard, where 22-year-old Jean-Baptisti Guingard was shot to death during a dispute seven hours earlier, police said.
The two incidents are not related, and no arrests were made in either case, police said.
Patterson was discovered dead at her Hollis home just before 11 a.m. Sunday by her stepfather, who had been tipped off by her boyfriend that something was wrong, police said. The stepfather called the police, who found Patterson's body in her bedroom, alongside a hastily scribbled suicide note, said officers who were still guarding the house as a crime scene Monday afternoon.
The suicide note was later discounted, however, after the city medical examiner determined Patterson was suffocated to death, classifying it as a homicide, said agency spokeswoman Ellen Borakove.
Patterson had been seeing her boyfriend, who has not been identified, for about nine months, and the pair along with Patterson's three children moved into the Hollis home in January, said Lenton Todd, who lives next door at 109-32 205th St. Although Todd said he did not know the family well, he said he sometimes heard the couple fighting.
“Her mother said he was very jealous of her,” Todd said. “He didn't like her going anywhere without him.”
About a month ago, the couple had a particularly violent fight, said Todd, who heard Patterson screaming as her boyfriend yelled at her to “shut the f— up.” Todd also believed he saw a confrontation between the couple become physical, but his view was blocked somewhat by Venetian blinds.
And while Patterson and her children, ages 12, 9, and 8, seemed friendly, the boyfriend did not, Todd said.
“I used to see the guy and he always had a mean look on his face,” he said. “He wouldn't say anything to me and I wouldn't say anything to him.”
In the second incident, Guingard, who lived at 173-17 89th Ave. in Jamaica, was shot in the right side and the back during a dispute outside Club Crystal in Hollis as the club was closing at about 3:45 a.m. Sunday, police said. He was taken to Mary Immaculate Hospital, but was pronounced dead 20 minutes later.
It was unclear what prompted the fight, but it began as club patrons were leaving, said one of the managers.
“We already flashed our lights and people were already leaving,” he said. “It started outside our property line. It didn't start inside the club.”
Reach reporter Courtney Dentch by e-mail at TimesLedger@aol.com, or by phone at 718-229-0300, Ext. 138.
