A Brooklyn man is headed to prison for more than two decades after a deadly 2021 shooting outside a Brownsville deli, a case that unfolded in broad daylight on a busy neighborhood corner and left a 33-year-old man dead. Waajid Pierce, 48, was sentenced Wednesday to 22 years behind bars after pleading guilty to first-degree manslaughter, a punishment that also includes five years of post-release supervision. The October 2021 killing has weighed heavily on the victim’s family ever since.
“No sentence can undo that unimaginable pain, but today’s prison term holds this defendant accountable,” District Attorney Eric Gonzalez said in a statement, according to the Brooklyn District Attorney's Office. The office said Pierce pleaded guilty on February 27 and that Brooklyn Supreme Court Justice Phyllis Chu imposed a term of 22 years in prison followed by five years of post-release supervision.
Prosecutors say Pierce walked up to a group of three men standing outside a bodega at Belmont Avenue and Mother Gaston Boulevard around 8:30 a.m. on Oct. 27, 2021, pulled out a handgun and fired three shots, hitting Daishawn Benjamin in the torso, arm and hand before fleeing in an Infiniti G35 sedan, according to BK Reader. Surveillance footage and other evidence later tied Pierce to the shooting, and that material became central to the prosecution’s case.
Pierce was arrested on March 2, 2022, as he got off a flight returning from Tampa at Long Island’s MacArthur Airport, police told Patch when they announced the arrest. He was charged in Benjamin’s death and held pending trial, then ultimately the plea that brought the case to a close.
Plea and sentence
The defendant pleaded guilty to first-degree manslaughter on Feb. 27, 2026, and was sentenced by Brooklyn Supreme Court Justice Phyllis Chu, the Brooklyn DA’s office reported. The case was handled by Senior Assistant District Attorney Joseph Mancino of the Homicide Bureau under the supervision of Assistant District Attorney Leila Rosini, according to the Brooklyn District Attorney's Office.
Family’s loss and an unsolved slaying nearby
Local reporting notes that Benjamin’s younger brother, Kizer Williams, was killed about three weeks earlier just a few blocks away and that that case is still unsolved, deepening the family’s grief, according to BK Reader. With Pierce’s plea and sentencing now complete, prosecutors said investigators will continue working on the earlier killing.
