A man with several arrests to his name had murder added to the list Saturday after Nassau County police charged him for allegedly shooting a New Cassel man dead on New Year’s Day.
Stephen Primm, 34, was charged with second-degree murder and criminal possession of a weapon, police said.
Primm shot Joseph Fountain, 40, four times with a 9 mm handgun at about 2:05 a.m. Thursday after an argument outside a Railroad Avenue home, Nassau County police Detective Lieutenant Commander George Darienzo said at a briefing Sunday morning.
“There was an argument that took place outside that premise in which our defendant interjected himself, intervened and shot our victim,” Darienzo said.
One witness told News12 Long Island he heard people yelling, then gunshots, as he returned home from a New Year’s Eve party.
“It’s very scary,” two other neighbors told the station of what may have been New York State’s first 2026 homicide.
Despite lifesaving measures by first responders, Fountain was pronounced dead at a hospital a short time later, Darienzo said, noting that witnesses had led investigators to Primm.
Primm pleaded not guilty in Nassau District Court on Sunday and was being held without bail pending another court appearance Wednesday, according to court records.
“I look forward to receiving discovery and fighting the case in the best way possible to the fullest extent of the law,” his defense attorney, Raymond Queliz, told Newsday on Sunday.
Primm’s record includes arrests for burglary, domestic assault and possession of a controlled substance, News12 reported.
