Ralph Berry, Fatal Shooting, New York 2000

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Ralph Berry, 55, Sentenced to Life in Prison for Fatal Shooting at Father’s Day Barbecue

A Bronx man has been sentenced to life in prison for the fatal shooting of an innocent bystander at a Father’s Day barbecue in the summer of 2000. Ralph Berry, 55, was convicted of ordering the shooting of a rival drug dealer, resulting in the death of Caprice Jones, 42, who was paralyzed from the waist down and died 10 years later.

On June 21, 2000, Berry, the head of a violent drug crew operating in the McKinley Housing Development in the Bronx, ordered one of his subordinates to shoot a rival drug dealer with whom he had been feuding over drug territory. The subordinate fired multiple shots into the Father’s Day barbecue being held on the McKinley Houses basketball courts, striking Jones in the spine.

The gunshot injury Jones sustained left him paralyzed from the waist down and ultimately caused his death in November 2010. Berry was sentenced to life in prison, in addition to five years’ supervised release and a $200 mandatory special assessment.

U.S. Attorney Damian Williams praised the outstanding work of the New York City Police Department and the Special Agents of the United States Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of New York in securing the conviction.

The case is being prosecuted by the Office’s Violent and Organized Crime Unit, with Assistant U.S. Attorneys Dominic A. Gentile, Adam S. Hobson, and Jacob R. Fiddelman in charge of the prosecution.

Berry, a resident of the Bronx, New York, was convicted following a jury trial on September 30, 2021, before then-U.S. District Judge Alison J. Nathan. Judge Nathan, now a U.S. Circuit Judge, imposed the sentence.