Kimberly Midgette was dropping off her daughter when prosecutors say an alleged gang retaliation plan targeted the wrong vehicle in Hempstead.
MINEOLA, N.Y. — More than three years after Bronx teacher Kimberly Midgette was fatally shot while dropping off her young daughter in Hempstead, prosecutors are asking a Nassau County jury to hold two men responsible for a killing they say grew from gang retaliation but struck an uninvolved mother instead.
The trial of Oumar Barry and Joel Badger places Midgette’s death at the center of a broader account authorities have developed about the Bloodhound Brims and violence across Long Island. Prosecutors say Barry helped set the attack in motion and that Badger took part in carrying it out. Both men have pleaded not guilty, and their lawyers challenged the state’s case when opening statements began Oct. 22.
Midgette, 44, was an elementary school teacher in the Bronx. According to Nassau County prosecutors, she arrived on Polk Avenue in Hempstead at about 1:33 a.m. April 1, 2023, to leave her 10-year-old daughter with the child’s father for the weekend. A friend was in the front passenger seat and the girl was seated in the rear when another vehicle passed and gunfire struck Midgette’s Toyota Corolla.
Midgette was critically wounded and died three days later. Her friend was shot in the arm and survived, while Midgette’s daughter was physically unharmed. Prosecutors have consistently said Midgette was not the person the shooters intended to attack. At trial, the prosecution described her death as the result of mistaken identity and alleged that the gunmen believed they had found a rival connected to an earlier dispute.
That claim distinguishes the case from a conventional dispute between victim and accused. Prosecutors have not alleged that Midgette was involved in the gang conflict they say preceded the shooting. Instead, the government’s theory is that a plan aimed at someone else reached her vehicle, turning an alleged act of retaliation into the killing of a teacher who had stopped on the street for an ordinary family errand.
The prosecution’s account also reaches beyond Nassau County. Suffolk County authorities said in 2024 that Barry was an alleged Nassau leader of the Bloodhound Brims and that he contacted an alleged Suffolk leader on March 31, 2023, asking for lower-ranking members to come west and carry out a shooting. Investigators said Badger and others later traveled to Nassau County and that members of the group used a stolen vehicle during the attack.
Those allegations were disclosed as part of a larger Suffolk County investigation that resulted in a 103-count indictment against 31 alleged gang members and associates. Authorities said the investigation covered 18 shootings as well as armed robberies and illegal weapons and alleged that members used violence against rivals as part of an effort to strengthen the gang’s influence. Prosecutors described Midgette’s death as one of the consequences of that alleged pattern.
The current Nassau County trial, however, requires jurors to decide the evidence against Barry and Badger individually. News 12 reported that prosecutors accused Barry of ordering the April 2023 shooting and Badger of firing at Midgette’s car. Barry’s attorney told jurors that his client never gave such an order. Badger’s defense argued that there is no forensic evidence linking him directly to the murder.
The jury began hearing testimony after opening statements, including evidence concerning the moments after the shooting. Emergency calls from Midgette’s former mother-in-law and ex-husband were played in court, and Midgette’s mother was among the prosecution’s first witnesses. The presentation begins what is expected to be a trial lasting at least several weeks.
Badger is already serving a 22-year sentence from a Suffolk County case involving robbery and conspiracy to commit murder, but that conviction does not determine whether he is guilty of the charges now before the Nassau jury. Barry likewise remains entitled to the presumption of innocence as prosecutors attempt to prove their allegation that he directed the attack.
The case now leaves jurors to evaluate how the April 2023 shooting was planned, who participated and whether the prosecution can establish each defendant’s role beyond a reasonable doubt. Until the Nassau County jury reaches a verdict, the murder allegations against Barry and Badger remain unproven.
Author note: Last updated Oct. 27, 2026.