By Nathan Duke
Police said they were searching for suspects in the fatal shooting of a 22-year-old Astoria man who was killed while in the process of moving out of his apartment.
Kalif Canady, who lived in the Astoria Houses at 27th Avenue, was found dead near his car just after 1 a.m. Saturday at the corner of Fourth Street and 27th Avenue in Astoria, police said.
Officers found Canady unconscious and unresponsive with a shot to his head. The victim was pronounced dead at the scene, but there have been no arrests in the investigation, which was ongoing, police said.
No one answered the door at an apartment where Astoria Houses residents said Canady had lived. The victim’s neighbors on the floor did not know Canady, but they said he and his family had not been in the apartment for long.
One tenant in the building who did not give her name said Canady had been in the process of moving out of the building and leaving for North Carolina on the night he was shot.
“It’s unfortunate,” she said of Canady’s death.
But the tenant said she believed some sort of trouble had followed the victim from his previous home in Brooklyn to Queens.
Another Astoria Houses resident who did not give her name said the incident did not cause her to fear for her safety or that of her grandchildren.
“Nothing like this has happened here before,” said the tenant, who has lived in the building for 17 years.
Police said Canady had previously been arrested on a marijuana possession charge. But a law enforcement source said the victim had also once been questioned in a murder case, but was never arrested in that incident.
Reach reporter Nathan Duke by e-mail at nduke@cnglocal.com or by phone at 718-260-4566.
