Published: September 06, 2008 12:29 am            

NIAGARA FALLS: Woman gunned down in Ashland Avenue alley

Falls police are searching for leads in just the second homicide of the year in the Cataract City.

Officers responding to a call of a disturbance just after 11 a.m. Friday, found the body of Dorothy Joelle Banks slumped in the front seat of her car in an alley in the 1300 block of Ashland Avenue.

“They found a vehicle that had collided with another vehicle,” Detective Capt. Ernest Palmer said. “The victim was in the driver’s seat, slumped over the steering wheel, with a gunshot wound to her right side.”

Banks, 35, 1923 18th St., was rushed to Niagara Falls Memorial Medical Center where she died from her wound.

Detectives said so far they have little to go on in their investigation.

“We don’t know (a motive for the shooting),” Palmer said, “and we don’t want to speculate.”

Palmer also said investigators killing are looking for witnesses.

“We have a witness who saw (a man) fleeing north on 15th Street, near LaSalle Avenue,” Palmer said. “But we have no one yet who witnessed the crime.”

The detective chief said police would like to identify the man seen running from the scene. He is described as a dark-skinned black man in his 20s, about 6 feet tall and wearing a red hoodie.

“We don’t know if that person is or is not involved (in the homicide),” Palmer said.

Palmer did question why someone would be wearing a hoodie, “when its 85 degrees out.”

Banks was no stranger to police. Palmer said she “has a prior criminal record,” but declined to say what charges are listed on her rap sheet.

Anyone who may have information about the homicide is asked to call Falls police detectives at 286-4553.

        

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