Mourners heartbroken over the random killing of an 87-year-old Queens man shot by a scooter driver while the victim was taking a midday stroll said Monday that the tragedy could have been even worse.
“Sometimes he walked with his wife.” said Debbie Almontasser of the Yemeni-American Merchants Association, where victim Hamod Ali Saeidi was a member.
But on Saturday, as shots rang out while a gunman zipped by on a moped, Saeidi walked by himself.
Almontasser joined hundreds of friends, family and community members at the Beit El-Maqdis Islamic Center in Sunset Park, Brooklyn, where Saeidi was walking before he was killed.
Mourners included Mayor Adams, who talked about two issues feeding violence in New York City — mental illness and guns.
“It appears as though the person had mental illness,” Adams said outside the mosque. “He used a ghost gun. All things I have been talking about over and over again.
“We have to get those things off our streets. We are steadfast in this. Anyone who pushes back on what we are doing should be here with this family.”
The mayor called Saeidi “a pillar of the city.”
Fourteen pallbearers carried Saeidi’s wooden coffin into the mosque while men in socks bowed and recited prayers in Arabic between moments of silence.
Ahmed Saeidi, the victim’s oldest son, spoke through tears.
“I am sad for my father and the other victims that got shot,” he said.
His brother, Main Saeidi, described the family as broken.
“He killed the whole family,” Main Saeidi said of the shooter. “He killed us. My father was a peaceful man. He was a good man. I ask everybody to pray for everyone who got wounded. If my father was alive, he would most likely forgive him. I cannot forgive.”
Hamod Ali Saeidi had four sons, two daughters, 30 grandchildren and 31 great grandchildren.
“My father was our backbone,” Main Saeidi said. “He built himself from nothing. He helped a lot of people get jobs.”
Hamod Ali Saeidi’s final moments were captured…
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