Burglar Killed In Queens Was Suspect In Baltimore Shooting: Cops

ST. ALBANS, QUEENS -- A potential burglar beaten and stabbed to death by two brothers in Queens was also wanted for a late July shooting in Baltimore, police said Tuesday.

The 26-year-old man, who police identified as Shamel Shavuo, was killed at about 2:45 a.m. when he tried to break into a St. Albans home on Williamson Avenue, cops said.

Baltimore Police said Shavuo was a suspect in a nonfatal shooting on July 20. A 44-year-old man was shot in the city's Lakeland neighborhood, roughly 75 miles from Shavuo's home in Hagerstown, Maryland.

Queens brothers Joel Paul, 27 and Michael Paul, 16, told police Shavuo knocked on their door and tried to force his way into the house, claiming to have lived there in the past, the New York Daily News reported.

The two managed to force Shavuo outside, where they bashed him in the head with a baseball bat and stabbed him in the torso with a cutting instrument, police said.

NYPD Chief of Detectives Dermot Shea said early reports that Shavuo was trying to break into the home still "need to be corroborated."

"We're still trying to determine what exactly took place here," he said in a press conference Tuesday.

Shea also indicated Shavuo had a criminal past in New York, saying the dead man "crossed our path before," but wouldn't go into detail about the allegations.

Lead photo by Renee Schiavone/Patch