Police sources: Brothers stabbed, one fatally, in dispute at Manhattan fish market; Aquino Hernandez Jr. arrested on murder charges
NEW YORK -- A dispute at a Manhattan fish market turned deadly on Tuesday.
The father of the two men allegedly stabbed by a worker says he wants to get the story straight.
The incident resulted in a father losing a son, and left him praying his other one survives.
"If anybody ever lost a child than you should know how I feel. You should know how I feel," Robert Burrell said.
He should have been celebrating his son's birthday with him. Malik Burrell would have turned 25 on Wednesday, but he was killed. Police say his 29-year-old brother, Robert, was also stabbed by an employee at Fish Express Fish Market on Saint Nicholas Place.
The father of two is still hospitalized.
"They real good kids. They was raised right, raised with manners, being thoughtful," Robert Burrell said.
Watch Jenna DeAngelis' report
Police sources say one brother went into the market on Tuesday night, ordered shrimp, and then got into an argument with workers. He allegedly took the food without paying, and an employee then grabbed him and the pair fought.
Sources say he left, returned with his brother and another fight broke out.
Video from inside allegedly shows a 34-year-old worker stab the two men and push them out of the market.
"What I want people to understand is that just because they are saying they stole some shrimp doesn't mean it's so, because it's not adding up. You don't stab nobody, how he stabbed my kids, over no damn shrimp," Robert Burrell said. "This is not no defense. This is none of that. This is clear murder. They did not have no weapons on them."
The market remained closed Wednesday.
A high-ranking police source explained, "If he's fighting them off with a knife, that's one thing. If he's charging at them with the knife, that's something else entirely."
Meanwhile, the family is mourning, sharing the brothers left their grandmother to pick up dinner and never returned.
"She's devastated. She's waiting on them to come back home with the food and they never came home. They never made it back," Robert Burrell said.
Police announced Wednesday night that 34-year-old Aquino Hernandez Jr., of the Bronx, has been arrested and charged with murder, assault and criminal possession of a weapon.
CBS2 reached out to the fish market for comment earlier Wednesday but did not immediately hear back.
