A Bronx middle school teacher hit by a bullet as he prepared his classroom for the first day of school didn’t immediately realize he had been struck, shaken family members said Thursday.
Jhairo Colon, 33, was in a sixth-floor classroom at the Angelo Patri School, on the corner of Webster Ave. and Folin St. in the Fordham section of the Bronx, just before noon Wednesday when someone fired several shots outside.
A bullet flew through the window and grazed the special education teacher, police said.
Colon, who had to miss the first day of school, told the Daily News he had left St. Barnabas Hospital Wednesday.
“It hurts a little bit. It burns,” Colon said outside his Bronx home, his right hand wrapped in a bandage.
But the teacher’s wife said it had bothered him so much that he couldn’t sleep the night he was shot.
“The hand hurts a lot,” said Marleny Colon, 28. “He doesn’t know how the bullet got inside.”
The victim’s brother-in-law said Colon didn’t even notice he’d been shot.
“The other teacher told him he was bleeding. He didn’t even feel it,” said German Diaz, 23. “He was just talking to the teacher. They were just having a conversation.”
Colon got seven stitches in his palm, said the brother-in-law — and is stunned by the close call.
“His sister asked him, ‘How you feeling?’ He was like, ‘I’m just laughing. I don’t know what else to do’,” Diaz said.
Colon has been a special education teacher with the New York City Department of Education since 2018 and specializes in math, according to his LinkedIn profile.
“Just think about how much more tragic that could have been,” Schools Chancellor David Banks said outside P.S. 257 John F. Hylan in Williamsburg, Brooklyn, where he greeted students on the first day of school Thursday morning.
“It hit his hand, and it wasn’t a serious injury. He went to the hospital, he was treated, and he’s home. He said, ‘I’m ready. I’m anxious to get back to school.’ But just think about how dangerous that could have been if it had hit a different part of his body. So we were able to avert a disaster,” said Banks.
When he spoke to Colon, Banks said the teacher told him he thought the sound of the gunfire was an electrical outlet in the classroom malfunctioning.
“It wasn’t until the [paraprofessional] told him, ‘You’re bleeding,’ and that’s when he realized. And then when they called the police, they saw the shell casing actually in the building,” Banks said.
Police said the school was not targeted in the incident.
“Let me be clear, this bullet was not fired from inside the school and at this point in the investigation, we believe it was fired from a long distance range,” Deputy Chief at Patrol Borough Bronx Keiyon Ramsey said at a Wednesday press conference.
No arrests have been made.