Pet parrot, stolen at gunpoint, reunited with owner

NEW YORK (WABC) -- If you're under the impression the cameras in city housing projects don't work, you should take Darryl Walker's story to heart.

They show him following a woman onto the elevator at the Governor Morris Houses in the Bronx.

She was holding her pet parrot in a cage and got off on her floor.

That's where cops say Walker pulled a gun and grabbed the cage.

When next we see him, he's running off with her bird.

"I'm sick I have high blood pressure. He pointed a gun, I tried to grab him but then he ran down the stairs," said Ana Marte, robbery victim.

Through a translator, Ana Marte said she doesn't understand why Walker didn't take her jewelry or cash, just her pet bird Cuca.

But Walker didn't get far. Cops used their viper camera system to track him as he walked in broad daylight to another building, where they watched him and the bird go up the elevator.

Within 24 hours, they had him in custody.

Barbara Holmes has lived in the Morris Houses for half a century.

Now she's president of the tenants' association and says the cameras have helped solve dozens of crimes.

"If you're going to do a crime, go to a project or a neighborhood that don't have cameras. Because if you come here you're going to get caught," Holmes said.

Walker learned that lesson the hard way and cops recovered Cuca and runited him with his owners on Friday.

When the 53-year-old allegedly confessed to the crime, he told them he had sold it.

Before this happened, Darryl Walker was already on parole for robbery.

Now cops hope he's learned his lesson after they caught him red handed stealing that green bird.

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new york city, animals, robbery, bronx, new york news

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