The Bristol Press - Bristol man allegedly admits to involvement in gang shooting

BRISTOL - A Bristol man arrested last week allegedly admitted to participating in a gang-related shooting on Davis Drive last year.

Keith “Fleet” Gainey, 28, of 187 Surrey Drive, was charged Friday in connection with the shooting of 34-year-old Vanessa Vazquez, of Terryville, who was shot six times in the upper torso on July 11, 2016. Gainey, the second suspect to be arrested in the case, is facing charges of attempted murder, first-degree assault, illegally discharging a firearm, carrying a pistol without a permit and first-degree reckless endangerment.

The day of the shooting, Vazquez was on Davis Drive visiting her friend, Christopher “Little” Solis, according to the arrest warrant affidavit. The warrant also said Vazquez has “strong ties” to the “DooWop” street gang - which reportedly controls the Cambridge Park housing unit - and Solis is a part of it.

During the investigation, police were allegedly told by an informant that Gainey admitted to him that he had shot Vazquez. The informant said Gainey had a “beef” with Solis, the warrant said.

After visiting Solis, Vazquez, shortly after midnight, was walking to her brother’s home on Davis Drive. While walking, she alleges, she saw Quadree “Splash” Rollins - who has also been charged - Gainey and another man standing near her brother’s apartment unit. At that point, according to the warrant, Vazquez saw Rollins pull out a gun and fire one round at her. She felt the bullet hit her and froze for a moment before Rollins allegedly pointed the gun at her again, at which point she turned to run away and felt several more bullets hit her.

Vazquez then heard a car speed off, she later told police. Some of the shots that were fired struck a nearby home where multiple children lived. A stray bullet also hit a nearby parked car. No other injuries were reported.

At the scene, police found two different caliber bullets, suggesting there were two gunmen, and a cell phone. Upon examining the phone, the warrant said, police could not obtain its owner’s “name or biographical information,” but found that it did contain photos of Gainey and his children.

In the ambulance, according to the warrant, Vazquez tried to tell police it was a rival gang member’s “boys” who shot her. After she was treated at St. Francis Hospital in Hartford, police said in the warrant, Vazquez was uncooperative in the investigation and temporarily relocated to Florida.

After moving back to Bristol, Vazquez saw Rollins in a Walgreens store on Main Street on April 27. She confronted him and began yelling at him, which prompted a police response. At the store, officers spoke to Rollins, who denied any knowledge of the shooting, the warrant said.

Vazquez told police she was 100 percent certain Rollins was the one who shot her. She added that she only knew the three men she saw on Davis Drive a year ago by their street names. One of them, she told police, included Gainey, who she identified through a photo lineup. Rollins, the warrant said, was the only person Vazquez could definitively say was seen shooting at her.

During Gainey’s arraignment Monday in Bristol Superior Court, Alfonzo Sirica, an attorney representing him during the bond argument, pointed out that the victim could not identify Gainey as a shooter and that it could not be verified that the phone found at the scene belonged to him.

Gainey’s criminal history, court officials said, includes convictions of second- and third-degree assault, failure to appear in court, interfering with police, second-degree unlawful restraint and operating under suspension. He is being held on $750,000 bond and is next scheduled to appear in court on Aug. 29 in New Britain, where the case has been transferred. Gainey has not entered a plea.

Rollins, who is facing similar charges to those of Gainey, has pleaded not guilty. His case is pending in New Britain Superior Court.

According to the warrant, the Davis Drive shooting may have been connected to other shootings in the area. Solis was the victim of a shooting in Farmington about a month before the incident on Davis Drive. He and his “associates” in DooWop have previously been the target of a rival street gang, the warrant said. The document does not name the gang.

According to the warrant, Rollins and another man were at one point suspects in the shooting that injured Solis. It is not clear if they were ever charged.

Furthermore, Solis currently has charges pending in connection with a shooting outside the Disabled American Veterans chapter, at 191 Riverside Ave., on Nov. 7, 2015, as a baby shower was going on inside. No one was injured, but the shots scared the large group of people who were at the gathering, according to police.  According to the warrant in that case, the shots were fired as retaliation with someone inside the baby shower, with whom Solis has had an ongoing dispute.

Justin Muszynski can be reached at 860-973-1809 or at jmuszynski@centralctcommunications.com.