A 15-year-old boy was pistol-whipped during a robbery near East 15th Street and Avenue J in Midwood just after midnight Wednesday, and newly released NYPD bodycam footage shows officers pulling a gun from the backpack of the 21-year-old man they arrested nearby. The teen suffered minor injuries and declined medical treatment, but police have not said whether he was the intended robbery victim or whether the man taken into custody, Tevon Fisher, is accused of assaulting him.
According to News12 Brooklyn, NYPD officers responding to the robbery report spotted Fisher nearby matching a suspect description and took him into custody. Investigators say they recovered a gun from his backpack during the encounter, and the department released body-camera footage showing Fisher holding what appeared to be a firearm. The station reports that the investigation remains ongoing and that police have not clarified whether Fisher is accused of striking the teen himself.
Why the Footage Surfaced So Quickly
The rapid release of bodycam video is not a coincidence. In March, Mayor Zohran Kwame Mamdani and NYPD Commissioner Jessica Tisch formally codified a policy, detailed by the Mayor's Office, requiring footage of critical incidents involving police force or weapon displays to be made public within 30 calendar days. NYPD regulations already required uniformed patrol officers to wear and activate body cameras before taking enforcement action, including responding to 911 robbery calls, and officers are barred from editing or deleting the footage once it's captured.
The Midwood intersection where the robbery occurred falls within the jurisdiction of the NYPD's 70th Precinct, which is headquartered on Lawrence Avenue and patrols Midwood, Flatbush, Ditmas Park, and Prospect Park South, according to city records. It's not the first time that stretch of East 15th Street and Avenue J has seen a violent incident targeting a teenager — in November 2023, three assailants targeted pedestrians, including a 15-year-old boy, in a series of street attacks at the same location, per FOX 5 New York.
A Precinct Bucking the Robbery Trend
The arrest comes even as major crime in the 70th Precinct has been falling sharply. Midyear 2026 NYPD CompStat data showed a 28.6% drop in major index crimes there compared to the same period last year — 206 fewer incidents, and the largest percentage decline of any precinct citywide, according to a Vital City analysis of the figures. That builds on a longer trend: total major crime across the precinct's Flatbush and Midwood coverage area plunged 89% between 1990 and 2018, and shootings fell 55% while homicides dropped 60% in 2021 following joint NYPD and Brooklyn District Attorney's Office enforcement operations targeting violent street crews, per the Brooklyn District Attorney's Office.
Even so, isolated violent street robberies keep surfacing across southern Brooklyn. Just six days before the Midwood arrest, Hoodline reported that a six-man crew pistol-whipped a 66-year-old man in nearby Marine Park, striking him in the head with a handgun and stealing his Toyota Sienna, within the adjacent 63rd Precinct.
What Fisher Could Face
If charged with carrying an unlicensed loaded firearm outside his home or business, Fisher would face Criminal Possession of a Weapon in the Second Degree under New York Penal Law § 265.03, a Class C violent felony carrying a mandatory minimum of 3.5 years and up to 15 years in state prison, according to Saland Law. Any robbery charge tied to displaying what appeared to be a firearm during the theft could rise to Robbery in the First Degree under Penal Law § 160.15, a Class B violent felony punishable by up to 25 years. Both statutes carry mandatory minimum prison terms upon conviction, and violent weapon possession convictions in New York are statutorily ineligible for record sealing.
The investigation remains ongoing, and key questions are still unresolved. Police have not said whether Fisher is accused of pistol-whipping the teen himself, and they have not confirmed whether the boy was the robbery's intended target.
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