An East Harlem father stabbed to death last week was still suffering health consequences from being shot nearly two decades ago — and police said on Sunday they’ve now caught his killer.
Michael Smith, 47, still had a bullet lodged in his chest from being shot in 2006 when he was fatally stabbed in an apartment near E. 132nd St. and Madison Ave. on March 17, his grieving family told the Daily News.
Cops on Tuesday arrested 63-year-old Anthony Jordan, charging him with Smith’s murder. The NYPD announced his arrest five days later, on Sunday.
Smith was just a few blocks away from his aunt’s home, who he often stayed with, in the Lincoln Houses when he was fatally stabbed.
“He was a loving person,” said the aunt, Dorothy Smith. “I can’t believe my nephew is gone.”
Police believe the killer knew Smith but cops couldn’t say Sunday why he was killed.
“He had friends over there. He was visiting them,” the victim’s brother Jerole Smith said of the area where the victim was killed. “We really don’t know how and what happened. We still trying to get information ourselves. He’s gone.”
Back on March 24, 2006, Smith was shot multiple times on E. 128th St. near Lexington Ave., about a quarter-mile away from where he was killed last week. Police made an arrest about six months later. The shooting left him unable to work, his family members said.
Smith had an arrest history and public records show he was paroled in June 1997 after serving 14 months in state prison for a Manhattan attempted robbery conviction.
“He had a heart of gold, he wouldn’t hurt a fly and they murdered him,” said Smith’s cousin, who did not want to be identified. “We’re just trying to grieve.”
Smith had three adult daughters who are struggling to accept the death of their father, according to his aunt.
“Mike was a great guy. It’s a tragedy,” said the man’s longtime friend Jovan James. “He’d give you food, a place to stay and the shirt right off his back.”
His murder is the second this year in the NYPD’s 25th Precinct, which saw seven slayings in all of 2023, according to police statistics.
Jordan was ordered held without bail on Rikers Island when he was arraigned in Manhattan Criminal Court.
With Rocco Parascandola
