Cover credit – Matt Meduri
The 2022 gubernatorial campaign between Governor Kathy Hochul (D) and then-Congressman Lee Zeldin (R-Shirley) was full of debate on contentious issues, but perhaps no issue was as pertinent as crime across the state, namely in New York City.
However, after a man jumped on stage and held a blade to Zeldin’s arm during a Rochester speech, the crime wave quite literally visited Zeldin’s doorstep.
On October 9, 2022, shots were fired at the front of the Zeldin home while his twin teenage daughters were home studying.
The drive-by shooting appeared to be gang-related at the time, and while the shots were not intended for the Zeldin home, the intended recipients of the bullets were hiding in the shrubbery in front of the porch.
Zeldin and his wife were campaigning in the Bronx. His daughters secured themselves in the house and called 911.
Twenty-year-old Noah Green pleaded guilty earlier this week for attempted murder, criminal possession of a weapon, and conspiracy for shooting at three men. Two of the men were hit by Green’s shots, but both survived.
“The events that took place on October 9, 2022, were traumatic for my family and couldn’t have hit any closer to home,” Zeldin said in a statement.
Green was arrested on October 31, 2022, just days before the gubernatorial election in which Zeldin would come up short to Hochul by just six points. He was previously one of eighteen defendants indicted in December 2022 following a long-term investigation into a string of violent crimes and carjackings perpetrated by the No Fake Love gang. Green said that the people he shot at were members of a rival gang.
Green will return to court for sentencing on October 15. He had faced a potential of twenty-five years had the prosecution not come to an agreement to sentence him for twelve years with five years of supervised release.
When asked by Judge Anthony Senft if Green was pleading guilty because he is, in fact, guilty, Green affirmed this.
Green’s attorneys assert that the defendant “comes from a good family” and that “he never wanted to be a part of this at all.”
Green was apprehended three weeks after the shooting after the stolen Honda SUV he had used in the October 2022 shooting was identified by law enforcement. Upon inspection, the vehicle was found to have shell casings still lodged in the windshield and hood. Police also found a loaded Taurus nine-millimeter pistol with a high-capacity magazine, the weapon later determined to have been used in the shooting.
Green was also found to have made frequent posts on social media about his gang affiliation, along with weapons and stolen vehicles.
District Attorney Ray Tierney (R) said that Green’s shooting outside the Zeldin home in Shirley was one in a series of shootings that all carried charges in the 148-count indictment. A murder outside of a Farmingville nightclub, violent carjackings in Wantagh and Wading River, and even the kidnapping of six puppies compose a string of crimes dating back to October 2021, all of which Green is allegedly implicated.
“I am thankful for Suffolk County District Attorney Ray Tierney, and the many law enforcement officials who swiftly acted to keep my daughters safe, transport the victims, and take the necessary legal action to hold Mr. Green accountable,” said Zeldin in a statement.”
