R.I.P. Lamont “Tip Dog” Thornton Harlem Basketball Legend
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Harlem basketball legend Lamont ‘Tip Dog’ Thornton stabbed to death by his son: NYPD
Harlem basketball legend Lamont “Tip Dog” Thornton was stabbed to death by his son inside their NYCHA apartment, police said Wednesday, touching off a crush of remembrances from fans and friends. Thornton, 58, was inside the eighth-floor apartment in NYCHA’s Rangel Houses in Washington Heights...
Harlem basketball legend Lamont “Tip Dog” Thornton was stabbed to death by his son inside their NYCHA apartment, police said Wednesday, touching off a crush of remembrances from fans and friends.
Thornton, 58, was inside the eighth-floor apartment in NYCHA’s Rangel Houses in Washington Heights when his 24-year-old son Lamont Oliphant allegedly stabbed him in the neck about 11:45 p.m. July 20, cops said.
The beloved hoopster ran out of the apartment and fled the building, “leaving an extensive trail of blood from the unit, down the hallway to the elevator, through the lobby and to the sidewalk, where he ultimately collapsed,” prosecutors said during the son’s initial arraignment in Manhattan Criminal Court. The single stab wound severed his artery.
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Responding officers found Thornton passed out on the sidewalk outside the building on Harlem River Drive near Frederick Douglass Blvd.
“I came home and there was blood on the floor, blood smeared on my door, there was blood everywhere,” said Wilton George, 40, a security guard who lives next door to the victim. “I was petrified to say the least. There were cops everywhere.”
Medics rushed Thornton to Harlem Hospital, where he was intubated, placed in a medically induced coma and underwent hours of emergency surgery. He clung to life for nearly two weeks before dying Friday.
“There was blood on the elevator door and the buttons. It was a crazy scene,” George added. “I never seen anything like it. He was obviously going door to door looking for help.”
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Another neighbor, Ana Montana, 75 said Thornton tried to get her to open her door.
“He said that I knew him and that he was bleeding,” she said. But fearing for her safety, she was hesitant to open up.
“I heard some arguing and then later he was knocking on my door but I didn’t answer it,” said Montana, who has lived in the building for 40 years. “I don’t open my door for nobody. I got shot years ago, so I learned my lesson. In the morning when I got up, my door was covered in blood.”
His son was initially charged with attempted murder but arraigned on upgraded murder charges Wednesday morning in the wake of Thornton’s death.
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Thornton, who graduated from the former Benjamin Franklin High School in East Harlem, was a neighborhood blacktop legend at Rucker Park in the 1980s who entertained thousands of fans at Harlem courts with his amazing moves.
Rest in peace.
Rest In Peace
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