BOKISSONTHRONE: Girl, 13, writes statement to man who shot and paralyzed her: ‘I have ... endured more pain in my short life than most people’

Tuesday, June 9, 2015

Girl, 13, writes statement to man who shot and paralyzed her: ‘I have ... endured more pain in my short life than most people’

A paralyzed girl broke down in tears in Brooklyn Supreme Court on Monday as she confronted the cold-hearted gunman who put her in a wheelchair when she was just 11.

“Thanks a lot for nothing,” Tayloni Maycik, now 13, wrote in a powerful victim impact statement.

Maycik was with family members outside her Bedford-Stuyvesant building when she was struck by a stray bullet.

“Because of your actions, I have known pain and endured more pain in my short life than most people.”

Kane Cooper had fired off ten shots at rival “Gates Avenue Mafia” gang members in May of 2013 — hitting only innocent bystander Tayloni, who’d been sitting in front of her Bedford-Stuyvesant building with family members.

Tayloni entered the courtroom in a motorized

wheelchair, parked in front of the prosecutor's table and as she caught a glimpse of Cooper, she burst into sobs.

The judge allowed her family to console her inside the court's well and Assistant District Attorney Ed Carroll stood in front of the girl in order to block her view of the admitted shooter.

Kane Cooper (pictured) copped the plea to felony assault and was sentenced to 17 years in prison. Cooper, 20, was firing at "Gates Ave. Mafia" gang rivals in May 2013 when a bullet hit Maycik in the neck.

Her big brother Daiquian then read his sister’s statement for her.

“I'm suffering from emotional distress, depression, anxiety and PTSD,” Daiquian, 17, read as he turned bravely face Cooper.

“I'm not as active as I used to be. I can't even run track or play double dutch even swim — you need to walk to do all these things,” she wrote. Tayloni Maycik, who was shot and paralyzed during a gang shoot out in May of 2013, is surrounded by family outside State Supreme Court in Brooklyn.

Tayloni Maycik, who was shot and paralyzed during a gang shoot out in May of 2013, is surrounded by family outside State Supreme Court in Brooklyn.

Tayloni’s mother, Priscilla Samuel, also spoke about how “dramatically” her family’s lives had changed since the shooting, but Cooper — who fidgeted and rolled his eyes through most of the sentencing — didn’t acknowledge her.

“I tried to look at him in his eyes, but he wouldn't look my way,” Samuel said.

Cooper, who’d pleaded guilty to the shooting, was sentenced to 17 years in prison.

Brooklyn District Attorney Ken Thompson said the sentence “spares the victim in this case the trauma of testifying about the life-altering day when she was shot by this defendant. She can now go on with her life knowing he will spend many years in prison as punishment for what he did.”