Slain man was helping friend
April 20, 2009
SAN FRANCISCO — Friends and family members could always count on Alexander Apalit, an ambitious, affable 21-year-old who fixed their cars, helped them move and offered them rides.
It was Apalit’s desire to help, his family said, that led to him being fatally shot Saturday night near Balboa Park.
Apalit was a passenger in a vehicle traveling near Otsego and Santa Ynez avenues when a carload of young men in a dark, four-door sedan with tinted windows — possibly an Infinity Q35 — opened fire at 9:15 p.m., San Francisco police Sgt. Wilfred Williams said. Apalit died a short time later at San Francisco General Hospital. No arrests have been made.
Apalit’s mother said her son lived with his family in Daly City. He had been eating dinner with his cousin and a friend when the friend’s teenage brother called to say he was being chased in San Francisco by group of young men. The trio drove to The City and picked up the teen boy. The suspects gave chase in the sedan, firing four or five shots toward the car.
Apalit, who was sitting behind the driver, was shot in the chest.
His companions rushed him to the nearest emergency room, St. Luke’s, where his mother said he was turned away. He was taken by ambulance from St. Luke’s to San Francisco’s only trauma center, General Hospital.
“I’m really upset about that,” his mother said. “He was struggling, but he was still breathing when he was at St. Luke’s. They’re an emergency room; couldn’t they help him anyway?”
St. Luke’s spokesman Kevin McCormack said privacy laws prevented him from commenting, but he could not imagine the injured man would be turned away.
“Emergency rooms, by law, have to treat whoever comes in,” McCormack said. “They would be treated and stabilized and sent on somewhere else if appropriate. Obviously, the place to send someone in San Francisco with gunshot wounds is San Francisco General.”
Apalit grew up in The City and attended Sacred Heart Cathedral High School, where he played football and set a school record in the long jump. He had worked as an automotive technician since 2007. Last fall, Apalit and two cousins started a party-bus business, shuttling revelers to various nightclubs in The City, his mother said.
Police described the suspects as three young Hispanic men, including the car’s driver, who wore a green hooded sweatshirt, and a stocky man about 6-feet tall. A fourth suspect is described as a young black man with a dark complexion and dreadlocks. The description of a fifth suspect is unclear.
Anyone with information is asked to call the Police Department’s anonymous tip line at (415) 575-4444.
Other incidents in The City this weekend:
- At 4:30 p.m. Friday, police responded to reports of gunfire at Griffith Street and Navy Road in Bayview-Hunters Point, Sgt. Wilfred Williams said. Officers found 21-year-old Norris Bennett laying on the ground with multiple gunshot wounds. The San Francisco resident was pronounced dead by paramedics.
- Around 2:05 a.m. Saturday, police were called to the corner of Market and Noe streets after a fight and found a person suffering life-threatening injuries. That person was taken to a hospital, police Sgt. Mike Evanson said.
- Just minutes later, officers received a call of shots fired in SoMa. The victim, identified by the medical examiner as Richmond resident James Jamonte Turner, 23, was found laying on the sidewalk with gunshot wounds. Three men were seen running from the area, Williams said. Turner died at San Francisco General Hospital.
- Around 9:15 p.m. Saturday, 21-year-old Daly City resident Alexander Apalit was killed when a carload of young men opened fire into the vehicle he was riding in, Williams said.
- At 6 a.m. Sunday, three stabbing victims were taken to General Hospital after a fight broke out at the End Up nightclub at 401 Sixth St., according to police. All three men are expected to survive.
