'I don't want to die': Times Square shooting victim speaks out as police hunt for gunman

NEW YORK - A woman who was shot in Times Square during a Mother’s Day trip to New York City with her family said that she prayed that her wound would not be fatal.

"I was literally screaming on the floor, ‘I don’t want to die, I don’t want to die, I have a 2-year-old,’" Wendy Magrinat, a 23-year-old Rhode Island resident, told the Daily News. "When I got shot, I told my husband to run because he had my baby girl."

The NYPD is searching for a person of interest after the shooting that injured Magrinat, another woman, and a 4-year-old girl on Saturday afternoon.

According to the NYPD, the shooting happened around 5 p.m. at 44th Street and 7th Avenue. 

NYPD Commissioner Dermot Shea said in a press conference Saturday evening that the shooting appears to have been the result of a dispute between 2-4 men. During the dispute, one of the men pulled out a gun and fired. 

The three people wounded were not involved in the initial dispute. 

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The youngest victim is a 4-year-old girl from Brooklyn who was in Times Square to buy toys with her family.  She was shot in the leg and was set to undergo surgery at Bellevue Hospital.

The final victim was a 43-year-old woman from New Jersey.  She was shot in the foot.

None of the victims are related to the others and all are reported to be in stable condition.

Police also released a surveillance video of a person of interest they are seeking in connection to the shooting.

"Thankfully, these innocent bystanders are in stable condition," Mayor Bill de Blasio said in a tweet. "The perpetrators of this senseless violence are being tracked down and the NYPD will bring them to justice. The flood of illegal guns into our city must stop."

"We have been taking guns off the street in New York City at an alarming rate over the last two years, and it's time now that we have consequences for those," Commissioner Shea said. "How many kids have to be shot before we take this seriously? …How many more kids do we need to be shot before we realize that bad policies have consequences?"

Some of the top polling Democrats running for Mayor of New York City also spoke out after the shooting.

"If the city cannot stop shootings in Times Square, what does that say about how we are investing in black and brown communities where we know the rates of gun violence are higher? The truth is New York City cannot afford to defund the police," said former Presidential and current Mayoral candidate Andrew Yang.

Brooklyn Borough President and former NYPD captain Eric Adams also said that if elected, he wants to put in place more programs to address gun violence.

"I call again for serious anti-crime measures to be implemented in this city," Adams said.

NYPD: Shootings, assault, overall crimes surge in April

The shooting is yet another incident in a shocking rise in gun violence throughout the city. According to statistics released earlier this week by the NYPD, the city saw shootings increase by a jaw-dropping 166% in April 2021, as compared to the same month last year. In the same time frame, overall crime has also risen by 30%. 

With the Associated Press.