A woman is claiming that her son, a New York City Administration for Children's Services employee, confessed to gunning down Bronx mother Wendy Martinez through her own front door peephole in 2018 — a killing that has gone unsolved for nearly eight years and appears tied to a gang vendetta that was never supposed to touch her at all.
Martinez, 45, was shot on November 24, 2018, inside her Concourse Village apartment when a gunman fired a single fatal shot through the door's viewing slot, according to the New York Post. She was home at the time with her then-11-year-old son. Police believe Martinez was not the intended target — investigators say the shooter was actually after her son, Brian Solano, who was 33 at the time of the report and had a criminal history tied to a years-earlier Bronx murder.
Responding officers who arrived at 760 Grand Concourse found Wendy Martinez inside her apartment with a fatal gunshot wound, and her 15-year-old son called 911 and hid in a closet, according to CBS New York. Detectives at the time tracked a black BMW 3 Series sedan with black rims fleeing north on Sheridan Avenue from East 161st Street as a key investigative lead, and surveillance video reportedly showed a masked man leaving Martinez's building with an open umbrella, per sources cited by the Post. That umbrella was ditched at the scene and is believed to still contain DNA that could identify the shooter.
A Gang Vendetta Traced Back to 2014
Police sources say the attack on Martinez's apartment was carried out by the Eden Boys, described as a rival Bloods offshoot, and that Solano was a Trinitarios gang member. The motive reportedly traces back to the December 2014 murder of 21-year-old Willie Lora, who was shot once in the chest in the lobby of an apartment building at 1566 Macombs Road in the Bronx's Mount Eden neighborhood, according to DNAinfo. Solano was accused of killing Lora and allegedly did so inside Lora's nearby Bronx apartment.
Solano's path through that case was anything but straightforward. He spent nearly three years detained on Rikers Island awaiting trial before being released without bail in late 2017, after private investigator Manuel Gomez uncovered a withheld 2015 NYPD interrogation video in which another man, Justis Colon, admitted to possessing the 9mm murder weapon, as reported by The Appeal. In a sworn affidavit, Colon further alleged that a prosecutor with the Bronx District Attorney's office tried to intimidate him into altering his videotaped statement. Solano ultimately entered a plea to manslaughter in Lora's death and served eight years in prison, and he was released on parole earlier in 2026.
Gomez had also said that Martinez's family received explicit death threats for more than two years before her murder, threats that were reportedly reported to the courts repeatedly without protective action, per LoveBScott. Police sources acknowledged that street retribution against Solano was widely anticipated even before the shooting occurred.
The Mother's Account
According to the woman's account, her son initially denied involvement in Martinez's killing but later admitted it during a conversation in a car in 2022. She said she recognized her son in surveillance footage from the case, telling investigators, “I recognized him. I recognized his build, his body, his walk, his run, everything. His whole persona — I know that person.” She said she directly asked her son whether he was involved, and he admitted his role.
Despite that claimed confession, the mother has not gone to police with the information — the account instead came to light through a private investigator, and no killer has been charged with Wendy Martinez's murder. Detectives are expected to speak with the alleged killer's mother soon, though whether that conversation produces charges remains an open question. The Bronx District Attorney's office did not return a request for comment on the case.
A Pattern Beyond One Bronx Building
Martinez was a hospital worker and mother of two; a coworker described her as hardworking, according to CBS New York's earlier reporting. Her death fits into a grim and recognizable pattern in New York City violence: in November 2021, a 37-year-old woman was shot through her apartment door peephole in Manhattan and taken to a hospital, according to PIX11; that victim survived after emergency surgery.
Cases like Martinez's also sit atop a structural problem. An analysis of NYPD homicide clearance records found that the department's dedicated Cold Case squad shrank from 50 detectives at its creation in 1996 to fewer than 10, with outer-borough homicides historically clearing at lower rates than those in Manhattan, according to Mother Jones. New York City murders reached record lows in 2026. According to the NYPD, its Detective Bureau maintained a murder clearance rate of 69% in 2025.
For now, the case of who fired through Wendy Martinez's peephole remains open. Investigators have a suspect vehicle description, an umbrella that may hold DNA evidence, and now a mother's secondhand account of a confession — but no arrest, and no answers yet for the family Martinez left behind.
