A deranged gunman shot and killed a 48-year-old Goldman Sachs employee “without provocation” on Sunday while the straphanger was riding a Manhattan subway train to brunch, cops said.
The shooter, who was still on the loose Sunday evening, was seen pacing back and forth in the last car of the northbound Q train around 11:42 a.m. before he pulled out a gun and opened fire on the unsuspecting victim, police and sources said.
“Completely random,” one police source said.
The victim, identified as Daniel Enriquez, was rushed to Bellevue Hospital, where he was later pronounced dead, police said.
“According to witnesses, the suspect was walking back and forth in the same train car and, without provocation, pulled out a gun and fired at the victim at close range as the trains [were] crossing the Manhattan Bridge,” NYPD Chief of Department Kenneth Corey said at a briefing.
When the train pulled into the Canal Street station, the gunman — described as a dark-skinned, heavyset man with a beard — fled the station by running up to Centre Street, Corey said.
The suspect was wearing a gray hoodie that said “Aeropostale” on it, according to sources.
The shooter and the victim didn’t know each other, according to Corey. No one else on the train was injured.
Enriquez, who lived in Park Slope, Brooklyn, and worked at Goldman Sachs, was sitting inside the moving train as it crossed the Manhattan Bridge, nearing the Canal Street station, when he was gunned down, cops said.
His sister told The Post that Enriquez was headed to brunch when he was mortally wounded.
Attempts to resuscitate him were unsuccessful.
Disturbing video footage shows first responders frantically trying to revive the mortally wounded man as he lay on the floor of the subway car — and as they carried him from the station on a stretcher.
It’s unclear how many other people were in the train car at the time, but police sources said detectives were speaking to at least five witnesses.
“Investigators are in possession of and currently reviewing the MTA security video obtained from the station” to try to ID and find the shooter, Corey said.
“We pushed a lot of additional officers down into the subway system,” Corey said. “We continue to do that to patrol this very extensive train system that we have and we’re going to continue doing that.”
New York City Transit president Richard Davey offered his condolences to the family and said the agency is working with detectives to solve the crime.
In a statement, Tony Utano, president of Local 100 of the Transit Workers Union, said the crew on the train “are rattled and traumatized” by the violent attack — “but they handled the incident and the aftermath calmly and professionally.”
The train’s operator, Luis Irizarry, began doing chest compressions on the mortally wounded passenger, the union said.
Conductor Walstein Chapman said a weeping straphanger told him about the shooting — and he immediately jumped in to calm other passengers.
“We did what we had to do,” Chapman said in a statement through the union. “My heart is still racing but I had to do what I had to do.”
The shooting is just the latest outbreak of transit violence in the Big Apple, which has seen a spike in subway attacks in recent months.
According to police, the incident is the fourth transit homicide this year, matching the same number this time last year.
“It’s unfortunately not that surprising a situation,” a visitor from San Francisco said while waiting for an uptown train at the Canal Street station Sunday.
“It’s definitely concerning,” said the tourist, who asked to be identified only as Eric. “But it’s also one of those things where, like, I’m from a big city and it’s just a big-city thing.”
However, one local straphanger was resigned to the city’s crime wave.
“S–t like this happens all the time,” Brooklyn resident Bill Taylor said at the Canal Street station.
“Things happen but you can’t let it scare you,” said Taylor, 27. “You could walk outside and get hit by a car. It’s just one of those things.”
