NYC mom still shaken after horrifying armed robbery in Bronx: ‘Don’t take my baby’
By Jack Morphet and Jorge Fitz-Gibbon
New York Post
March 10, 2022
Maxi Feliz was still frightened when interviewed by The Post
A single Bronx mom on Thursday recounted the harrowing moment she had to beg for her autistic 3-year-old son’s life — as a pair of robbers put a gun to his head as they were on the way to school.
Maxi Feliz, 35, said she clung desperately to her young son as one of the gunmen tried to pry him away from her in the lobby of their apartment building Wednesday morning.
“I begged them, ‘Take everything but don’t do anything to my baby,'” Feliz told The Post on Thursday. “The guy who had his gun on me encouraged the other guy to take the baby and I was screaming, ‘Don’t take my baby!’
“I held on to Max and they tried to tug him away from me, but then they gave up and ran out,” she said. “I walked out and screamed for help, then one of the guys came back, pointed his gun at me and told me to go home.”
Feliz was taking Max to his school drop-off around 8:20 a.m. Wednesday when the gunmen accosted them in the lobby of their Kingsbridge Heights building.
“My son is autistic,” she said through an interpreter. “I believe my son has a gift and can sense danger instinctively. Max loves going out. He hates staying inside the apartment all day. Every morning Max waits excitedly by the door for us to leave.
Maxi Feliz begged the group to not take her child from her
The incident happened as Feliz was set to take her child to his school drop-off
The thieves made off with $1,500 and then took off in the Range Rover
“But yesterday he did not want to go out,” she said.
They made off with her purse, which she says is worth $1,500, her phone, and drove off in her white Range Rover after dumping Max’s child safety seat on the sidewalk.
The NYPD later released surveillance photos of the heartless thieves as they fled.
Police said the two were staking out the lobby of the building for more than an hour before pulling off the robbery — and Feliz believes it was a setup.
“Just because my car looks nice doesn’t mean I am rich,” she said. “I moved to America to work hard and make a better life for myself. I built up good credit and was able to buy a comfortable car for my son and I.
“Plenty of Range Rovers drive past here,” she added. “I don’t know why I was targeted.”
Feliz, a native of the Dominican Republic, moved to the US in 2013 to find a better life, and became a citizen last year, she told The Post.
Police said the robbers were staking out near the building for more than an hour before the incident
Feliz hugs son Max
Divorced five years ago, she said she makes ends meet by driving for Uber Premier and Lyft Lux while working another job on the side as an event promoter
Now, she says the nightmarish encounter in her lobby has scarred both her and her son.
“Max has been really stressed since the robbery,” Feliz said. “He has been banging on the walls, pacing up and down, and just wants to hold me all day. He can’t express himself, but I am 100 percent sure he knows what happened to us.
“You don’t violate a baby,” she added. “You don’t. You respect a baby. I hope these men find a conscience and realize what they have done to an innocent woman and child.
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