York Daily Record | By Ted Czech
Felipe Bernabe had just parked his truck - a maroon pickup with an open trailer in tow - when he was shot Monday night, just across the street from his home, said his longtime girlfriend Patricia Cruz.
"He got out of the truck, and somebody shot him," Cruz said through interpreter Alberto Justiniano on Tuesday morning.
Cruz did not see the shooting, but one of her daughters heard and saw the commotion outside afterward, and alerted her mother, Justiniano said.
On Tuesday, family and friends gathered at the home Bernabe and Cruz shared with their two daughters, ages 16 and 10. His younger daughter lay on a couch in the living room, wrapped in a white sheet, sobbing.
Bernabe, 43, was shot around 10:25 p.m., and died more than an hour later at York Hospital, according to Deputy Coroner Steve Cosey.
York City Police were dispatched to the 600 block of East South Street where they found Bernabe lying in the middle of the street, police said.
A autopsy performed on Bernabe's body Tuesday determined that he died of a "gunshot injury to the back," and that the manner of death was homicide.
As of Tuesday evening, police had not released any further details.
Cruz, 42, said she and Bernabe had grown up in the same small Mexican town and decided to leave and journey to the United States about 17 years ago.
"We came here looking for job, better life for us, for our family," she said. "He was the best father."
Bernabe worked for Joe Anthony's landscaping business for about five years, and then, several years ago, Anthony helped Bernabe start his own landscaping company.
Bernabe wanted his family to have a better life, and so he encouraged Cruz to take English lessons and enrolled his daughters in private school, Cruz said.
With Cruz stricken with cirrhosis of the liver, Bernabe was the sole source of income in the family, but he was able to do it, simply by working hard, she said.
"He never let me work," she said.
"All he talked about were his daughters and his wife, he was a real family man, but he worked all the time," Anthony said.
Anthony, who drove to Bernabe's home Tuesday when he heard what had happened, thought that maybe Bernabe was the victim of a botched robbery.
Bernabe was short, but very tough, having boxed earlier in his life, Anthony said.
Justiniano, who worked for Bernabe, called him, "a real nice person, he was a real decent guy."
He added that he had seen Bernabe's truck parked at the rear of his home about 10 p.m. and was stunned that a half-hour later, he was dead.
"I don't know why, he don't do nothing to anybody," Justiniano said. "I hope they get who shot him; they got to pay for it."
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