A 21-year-old East Harlem student who was stabbed to death outside his grandmother's home might have been the victim of mistaken identity, his family says.
Friends and family remember Glenn Wright as a shy, responsible and intelligent young man who volunteered and took care of a younger brother with Down Syndrome.
Mourners are holding a vigil tonight outside the East Harlem Tutorial Program where Wright worked and volunteered. Friends have also put a memorial page up on Facebook.
Relatives said Wright was killed as he was taking a break from helping his grandmother wash windows Saturday outside the Baruch Houses on the Lower East Side. That's when a group of men attacked him, stabbing him in the neck during the dispute, police said. He died Sunday at Bellevue Hospital.
Police on Tuesday said the killing may have stemmed from a dispute between Wright and Joel Herrera, 20, who has been arrested on a murder charge. They are also investigating the possibility that Wright was the victim of mistaken identity.
The young man was the third youngest of nine siblings, one of whom died as an infant, and he visited his grandmother at the Baruch Houses every weekend, family members told The New York Times. In 2006, when a neighborhood after-school program started a robotics team, Wright signed up, emerging as one of the leaders.
“In this profession, you’re not supposed to have favorites, but he was probably my favorite,” said Kristian Breton, who coached the 19-member team, which beat the city’s elite schools in a regional competition, then lost in the national competition in Atlanta.
