The bloodstains on the elevator at the Tillary Street Women’s Shelter lingered for days.
Two residents of the 200-bed homeless shelter in Downtown Brooklyn had gotten into a brawl in early September 2024, when one of them told the other not to press the elevator’s buttons because she needed to go use the bathroom and did not want to wait longer, according to facility records and three people with knowledge of the event. One woman punched the other so hard in the face that blood splattered on the floor and walls. Staff called 911 and emergency responders came, but the battered woman declined medical attention and pressing charges.
“Everyone was like, ‘Did you see the bloodbath?’” said Cook, a former resident who had moved in hours before the altercation, and asked that her first name be withheld out of concern her history of homelessness would affect her ability to find work. “They were just in shock.”…