The grieving mom of a Bronx man bashed to death just outside his supportive housing building says she spoke to him just two hours before the deadly attack — and it seemed he was having a day like any other.
Joel Rivera, 44, was struck in the head with a blunt object about 7 p.m. on Jan. 21. It is believed his killer struck him with a two-by-four.
“It was a regular day for him,” Rivera’s mother, Patricia Rivera, told the Daily News Monday. “I said, ‘What are you doing?’ He said, ‘Oh, getting my day started. I’m about to feed the dog’.”
They said they’d talk later and she heard him call out, “Come on, let’s eat,” to his pup, a tiny Havapoo named Scarlito.
Those were the last words she ever heard her son say.
Though cops initially said Joel was attacked in his apartment in the Muller Residences on Nereid Ave. in Wakefield, a representative of The Doe Fund, which runs the building, clarified that the attack happened outside and was caught on camera.
A worker in the building reported what happened to cops after the victim came home hurt, said Doe Fund spokesman Christopher Luggiero.
Joel died six days after the attack, and the case has been ruled a homicide. Authorities have still provided no information about motive.
“He was on blood thinners which then caused him to bleed into his brain,” Patricia, 64, told The News. “He had a heart condition. He had suffered a heart attack last year and then he’d suffered another heart attack later in the year.”
He was also an organ donor and was kept alive on a ventilator to make arrangements for organ donations, she said.
Joel’s mother sad she doesn’t know anything about the suspect, Richard Vasquez, 37, who lives a few blocks away. He was arrested Feb. 14 and charged with murder. He remains held without bail.
“My son and I spoke daily to an extreme,” Patricia said of the victim. “He shared with me everything. Sometimes too much. And I know I never heard of this individual. So it came out of left field and I’m still trying to figure out why did this happen.”
“I don’t think he was a friend,” she said of the suspect.
Joel’s late father was a 24-year veteran of the Marine Corps. He and his family lived in California, Hawaii, North Carolina and New Jersey over the years, and came to the Bronx in 2021, the same year the Muller Residences opened.
“It was a pretty safe haven for him,” his mother said. “My son had mental health issues — severe depression. Since he was small, my son was diagnosed at the age of 5 with ADHD.”
Joel loved music and was an avid fan of Al Pacino, naming his dog, Scarlito, after two of the actor’s films, “Scarface” and “Carlito’s Way.”
“He was very very smart. Very bright kid. He was able to retain things. He’d read. He loved to watch documentaries on TV. He loved to cook. Watch the cooking channels,” Patricia said. “He cooked himself, to try different recipes… He shared his food with everybody in his building. His housing director said, ‘If Joel had food, everybody had food’.”
She wants to see her son’s accused killer pay, whatever the motive may have been.
“I just want to see justice done. I want to see this individual, if he did it, to pay for his crime,” she said. “If they had an issue, if they knew each other and they had an argument, whatever. Nobody has the right to take somebody’s else’s life.”
