The NYPD insisted Friday that the teens who helped nab a deadly subway arson suspect are still in line for the $10,000 reward — but the boys’ families said that’s not what they were told.
A police spokesperson said no determination has yet been made on whether the cash should go to a trio of eagle-eyed high school basketball players — who turned in Sebastian Zapeta-Calil hours after he allegedly burned a woman to death.
But one of the families said the new NYPD claims contradict what they were told by reps of the Crime Stoppers tip line — who they said told them the kids would get nothing because they called 911 and not the official tip number.
“That’s not what they told us,” the father of one of the boys, Navid, told The Post Friday.
“What [the NYPD] told me was the fact that they have nothing to do with the reward money. That’s done by Crime Stoppers, and the Crime Stoppers told me that since the kids didn’t use the tip hotline and he was 911, that’s why they’re not eligible.”
“Whether it’s correct or not, that’s exactly what they told me.”
When asked if Crime Stoppers made it “explicitly” clear his teenager had no chance at collecting the prize, the Brooklyn dad agreed: “That is correct.”
Neither the NYPD nor Crime Stoppers even took down the family’s information — raising the question of how the family was going to be contacted in the future should the anonymous tipster agency decide the three 14-year-olds deserve the money.
Navid, along with friends Christos and Kingson, felt that their hopes were dashed — along with their plans to beef up their college savings accounts with the prize money.
“I wouldn’t know. I washed my hands of the fact after they told me this, I thought, ‘That’s too bad,’” Navid’s father continued.
Following The Post’s exclusive reporting on Thursday, the NYPD provided a more detailed statement in which it maintained it would not be responsible for determining whether the boys received the highly publicized $10,000 prize.
NY Post
The agency maintained it would not make the determination on whether the boys receive the sum, but could not answer why the family was led to believe the case was closed.
“The NYPD remains grateful to these young individuals for their support on this case. These situations are reviewed and decided on a case-by-case basis, and no one has been denied any potential reward money in this case. This will be reviewed just like every other case,” a spokesperson said in a statement.
The NYC Police Foundation, the nonprofit that oversees the city’s Crime Stoppers unit, did not clarify why one of its staffers told Navid’s family they were at a dead end.
The NYPD’s new assertion that the teens could still win the prize money did little to quell the parents’ concerns, however, with Christos’ mother telling The Post she was “still under the impression” the boys were ineligible.
“Quite simply, the boys did an exceptional job of keeping people on the train calm and catching the perpetrator. And then the police stepped in and took the perpetrator. Now, the kids deserve the reward money. The police are essentially stonewalling and saying, ‘No, it’s this department. No, it’s that department. To me, that’s not acceptable for the kids,” Christos’ mother, who asked to remain anonymous of her son, fumed.
“This is just bureaucratic red tape and it’s bureaucratic red tape over something that could be simply and easily resolved. We’re not asking for $1 million. We’re just asking that these kids get recognized for what they did.“
While the NYPD and Crime Stoppers have yet to cough up the sum, at least seven Post readers reached out Friday and offered to cover the full $10,000.
One of the generous donors was none of the one-time owner of the New York Post and former MTA chairman Peter Kalikow — who developed the “See Something, Say Something” slogan.
“These young men called 911 and identified the criminal who set this poor woman on fire and took action to help in his capture. The fact that they didn’t have the Crime Stoppers tip line shouldn’t deprive them of this well-earned reward,” the ex-subway boss told The Post.
Kalikow is brokering a deal with the NYC Police Foundation to get the trio the $10,000 reward — which he is paying out of his own pocket.
“You want to encourage people to do this and to put up a roadblock of bureaucracy in their way — it’s terrible,” Kalikow continued, adding that he hoped to meet the three young men personally.
“[14 years old is] exactly the formative years where you can make these kids good citizens or people can say, ‘I don’t give a damn because nobody else gives a damn.’ That’s what you don’t want to happen.”
The families of Navid, Kingson and Christos promised that they would continue pursuing the $10,000 sum, especially following the NYPD’s news that the case was still under review.
