Over the past several months, concerns about the site’s size and location — steps from the historically contaminated Gowanus Canal in a zone polluted with toxins — have cropped up.

The debate came to a head Monday, when many of those issues were overshadowed by safety concerns and fears of migrant-driven crime or drug use in the area, several people present at a town-hall style meeting told the Daily News. While the shelter sits on a lot zoned for manufacturing, it is a short distance from a more residential area featuring the area’s trademark brownstones.

Michael Racioppo, District Manager of Brooklyn Community Board 6, called much of the backlash voiced “racist.”

“We understand that people can be concerned about change when it comes to neighborhoods, but rhetoric can venture into pretty racist areas and we will not support that in any way shape or form,” Racioppo said.

More than 179,000 migrants have come to New York City since spring 2022. In response to the influx, the city has opened 217 emergency shelters.

“Additional capacity is desperately needed, and we need every community to come together as we identify viable capacity across all five boroughs to meet the urgent need for shelter,” Department of Social Services spokesperson Neha Sharma said in a statement.

The Gowanus shelter will be managed by the non-profit BHRAGS Home Care and will house 400 single adults. Although it’s an emergency site, residents were given months of advance notice, according to DSS. BHRAGS did not respond to a Daily News request for comment.

The city plans to open the shelter in the spring, but a date hasn’t yet been finalized.

Monday’s meeting was intended to inform and update the neighborhood of the city’s plans. The meeting was hosted at the City Life Church and Academy, with the Department of Social Services, Department of Homeless Services, BHRAGS and Councilmember Shahana Hanif.

Flyers distributed ahead of the meeting encouraged residents to discuss concerns including the potential community impact on “youth physical and mental health safety, general community outcomes, vagrancy, detritus, crime,” as well as whether the shelter provider would meet the task of supplying necessary services for 400 residents and whether the site could be turned into a permanent homeless shelter in the future.

“The sentiment is that folks who will arrive in the neighborhood are illegals,” City Councilmember Shahana Hanif said of the neighborhood backlash. “… And therefore, that’s a problem, that they should not be welcomed here.”

The site must check a few more boxes before opening, Hanif said, including an environmental impact study that is underway.

“In terms of the pushback from our neighbors — ‘these folks are criminals,’ the concerns around the uptick of drug use, the default xenophobia and racism — that will not prevent me from welcoming these newcomers into our community,” Hanif told the Daily News.

The site borders properties that have been found to have multiple toxins in their soil — an issue that has featured heavily among neighborhood concerns. They have also raised questions about the experience of the company being brought in to operate the facility.

Eric Weingartner, a resident of the area and former CEO of The Door, accused the city of “sidestepping every best practice as it relates to environmental smarts,” by placing the shelter in a potentially contaminated building.

“They are choosing to make a terrible decision to cross 400 people off their list, and that’s nuts,” Weingartner said. “It’s literally government at its worst.”

“Everybody knows that putting this type of density in one building, especially with no services that are of substance, is literally going to create chaos,” he said. “It’s super unsafe for the residents. It’s super unsafe for the community.”

Third Street Block Association, as well as several individual members, filed a lawsuit late last week in Kings County Supreme Court claiming the city violated the law by moving forward with plans to convert the former brewery into a shelter when it’s not zoned for housing.

The suit alleges the city didn’t take proper steps for an environmental review or consider the highly-polluted history of the Gowanus Canal.

“In sum, the decisions of HPD and DOB, together approving the conversion of the industrial building on the Development Site to residential rooming units, should be vacated and set aside as arbitrary and capricious and contrary to law,” the lawsuit reads.

“We’re not opposed to the shelter coming in,” said Robert Mesnard, the president of the Third Street Block Association and a named plaintiff in the lawsuit.

“We support shelters and we support the city giving support to the migrants that are coming here to get settled in New York. Our issue would be the scale of the shelter, which at over 400, is out of scale with the low-rise residential neighborhood it’s been placed in.”

In a procedural hearing in Superior Court in Maricopa County, accused killer Raad Almansoori indicated he would neither plead guilty nor accede to an immediate extradition should one come. Instead, a formal extradition process could be kicked off once Arizona Gov. Katie Hobbs receives a request originated by Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg.

In the meantime, a trial for a pair of Arizona stabbings blamed on Almansoori is expected to get underway.

“The local charges by law have to be resolved before anything can happen with your New York case,” said local Commissioner Barbara Spencer.

Almansoori allegedly bludgeoned and strangled Denisse Oleas-Arancibia of Queens to death last month in Manhattan, afterward traveling to Arizona, where he’s accused of stabbing two women.

Upon being arrested there, the man allegedly told authorities to google the SoHo hotel as the NYPD hunted for Oleas-Arancibia’s killer.

But then grandstanding Maricopa County Attorney Rachel Mitchell refused to send him to the Big Apple, saying she didn’t trust Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg to handle the case.

“Having observed the treatment of violent criminals in the New York area by the Manhattan DA there, Alvin Bragg, it’s safer to keep him here and keep him in custody so he can’t be out doing this to individuals either in our state or county or the United States,” said the Republican Arizona prosecutor, who’s up for reelection.

Bragg, a Democrat, fired back, accusing Mitchell of playing “political games.”

His office indicated Monday it would move ahead with an extradition request.

“Seeking justice for victims and survivors is our priority at the Manhattan DA’s office. We do not stand on ceremony but prioritize the integrity of the process,” Emily Tuttle said in a statement.

“We are proceeding as we do in each and every case involving an out-of-state arrest: following the facts and the law to ensure justice is served,” she said.

Oleas-Arancibia’s body was found in a room at the SoHo 54 hotel on Feb. 8, with a bloody iron next to her and bits of plastic embedded in her head.

Almansoori flew to Arizona shortly after the killing, where, weeks later, he was arrested as a suspect in the attempted murders of two Arizona women. While in custody there, he confessed to murdering Oleas-Arancibia, 38, and described the killing in graphic detail.

After he’d already fled, NYPD detectives identified him as a suspect from matching up his credit card number from a Burger King receipt found in bloody pants he left in the hotel room where Oleas-Arancibia’s body was found.

“Not a single woman on this planet likes me, so I was very upset,” Almansoori allegedly told police when he was arrested.

Almansoori was indicted by a grand jury last week in Arizona and is being held without bond on the charges in the state.

He’s suspected of stabbing an 18-year-old victim multiple times in the neck after following her into a Surprise, Ariz., McDonald’s bathroom and crawling under a stall. Almansoori is also accused of stabbing a 22-year-old woman in Phoenix in her car. He allegedly had planned to kill his father and stepmother and burn down their house, an Arizona police detective testified last week.

With Molly Crane-Newman

Boada, 22, became the face of right-wing backlash after he was photographed flashing twin birds at reporters and insisting he was innocent as he left his arraignment in late January.

A “thorough and diligent investigation” cleared Boada in the case, the DA’s office said in a statement. “Jhoan Boada has been exonerated as a participant in this assault,” the statement said.

Boada was mistakenly arrested two days after the assault, when officers found he matched their description of a man in a black and white jacket with pink shoes, according to the DA’s office.

During his Jan. 31 arraignment, Boada’s attorney adamantly denied the Venezuelan migrant was involved in the brawl. Boada was released without bail.

When leaving his arraignment, Boada flipped two middle fingers to the news cameras that followed him out — becoming the face of the political firestorm that soon ensued.

His image, splashed on headlines across the country, became a symbol for right-leaning Americans of the dangers of immigration and sanctuary city laws.

It drew the anti-migrant fury of Americans from Texas to Great Neck, L.I. Mazi Pilip, a Republican who lost her special election bid to fill George Santos’s seat in Congress from Queens and Nassau Count, posted a picture of Boada and labeled him a “thug.”

The incident prompted calls from elected officials, including Gov. Hochul, for stronger punishments from the DA’s office.

“I don’t understand,” Boada said in Spanish at the time. “I didn’t do nothing.”

The DA’s office says Boada was mistaken for another suspect, Marcelino Estee.

Estee was arraigned late Friday in Manhattan Criminal Court in the assault on the officers. His bail was set at $15,000 cash or $30,000 bond.

The chaotic Jan. 27 confrontation started when police officers approached a group of migrants standing on the edge of the sidewalk in front a shelter building, ordering them to move. It escalated when they moved to arrest a man, and the group of migrants then attacked the two cops, kicking and punching them.

After this high-profile incident, fears of a “migrant crime wave” have spread with little evidence to back up the idea that any significant rise in crime is being driven by the more than 170,000 asylum seekers who’ve arrived in the city since spring 2022.

Boada initially faced charges of attempted assault on a police officer and gang assault, but he was indicted with the others first arrested in the attack as the DA’s office continued to investigate his role in it.

Five other migrant men allegedly involved in the Jan. 27 attack were ordered held on bail last month on felony charges brought by a Manhattan grand jury.

With Kerry Burke

Fire department officials busted the makeshift housing setup at on Monday around 11 p.m. during an inspection of the Richmond Hill, Queens, property in response to complaints about e-bikes stored in the backyard of the building.

Inside, officials found around 40 mattresses and beds crammed floor-to-ceiling on both the ground floor and basement of the building, home to a furniture store, the FDNY said.

FDNY vacated the building, sending the men who were living there to the city’s emergency management department to get shelter.

The Department of Buildings issued two violations to the building’s landlord, 132-03 LIBERTY AVENUE MGMT CORP. The location is zoned for commercial use, not for residential.

“The system did its job,” Adams said.

Adams said the situation points to the larger issue of affordable housing in New York City and pointed the finger at Albany, adding that “we got nothing out of Albany last year” to help the housing crisis.

“When you have a situation like what we’re facing here, there’s some that are going to attempt to exploit it,” Adams said, referring to the ongoing migrant crisis. “There’s some who are going to attempt to do illegal housing.”

However, the man orchestrating the slapdash setup said he did it all out of empathy for the migrants.

Ebou Sarr, the owner of Sarr’s Wholesale Furniture store, told PIX11 that as an immigrant from Senegal himself, he felt like he had to do something to help the recent migrants.

“The city is saying that they have no place for these people,” Sarr tearfully told the news station. “It’s not true.”

Sarr told WPIX he was charging around 70 mostly Senegalese migrants living there around $300 a month to sleep there. They received breakfast, lunch, and dinner.

Inspectors from the Department of Buildings also found “severe overcrowding and hazardous fire trap conditions” in the basement level, with no ventilation or natural light, the department said.

At the same Tuesday press conference, Deputy Mayor Maria Torres-Springer said the setup is a sign of the city’s housing shortage.

“Too many people make desperate choices about where to live and what to pay for,” she said. “And at the root of that is the fact that we haven’t built enough housing.”

“The reality is with 180,000 people entering this city also looking for housing, over 65,000 currently in our system, if we don’t build more, we’re going to build more problems,” Adams said.

Thousands of migrants have come to New York City since spring of 2022 when an influx of people arriving from the southern border picked up. The number of people living in the local shelter system has doubled as a result. In recent months, the Adams administration has implemented a policy that moves migrants out of their assigned shelter beds and requires they reapply for a new bed every 30 or 60 days.

With Thomas Tracy

The suspect is accused of brutally murdering Denisse Oleas-Arancibia in a room on the 11th floor of the SoHo 54 hotel. Bits of plastic were found embedded in her head and a bloody iron was next to her when her body was discovered Feb. 8, according to authorities.

After a dispute over how long he would stay in the hotel room, Almansoori began choking her with his hands and forearms, Jeremy Goebel, a Surprise, Ariz., police detective said Monday.

The attacker tried to snap her neck, turning it from side to side, and hit her in the head with an iron multiple times, he added. Almansoori then tried to suffocate Oleas-Arancibia with a sock and blanket, according to Goebel.

“In his words, ‘She just wouldn’t die,’” said the prosecutor questioning the detective.

Following Oleas-Arancibia’s murder, Almansoori, 26, fled to Arizona, where he was arrested Feb. 18 for stabbing two other women.

Upon his arrest, he indicated to cops that he’d come from New York because he was on the run after the murder.

“Not a single woman on this planet likes me so I was very upset,” he told police, adding that he was addicted to sex and was broken because of it.

Commissioner Lindsey Coates ruled in the Maricopa County, Ariz., courtroom that Almansoori will remain behind bars without bail due to the danger he poses to the public.

Shortly after his arrest, the suspect blabbed to the cops about the murder and attempted killings, going into “graphic detail” about how he took the life of Oleas-Arancibia basically unprompted, according to Goebel.

Almansoori described to Arizona police that he and the victim had met on an online website and arranged a meet-up at the hotel.

Goebel also recounted two terrifying incidents in Arizona. In one, Almansoori allegedly followed an 18-year-old victim into a McDonald’s bathroom, crawled under a stall and pepper sprayed and stabbed her in the neck as she screamed. The victim later described Almansoori as having “evil eyes.”

He’s also accused of stabbing a 22-year-old woman in Phoenix after forcing himself into her car and had a plan to kill his father and stepmother and burn down their house, according to Goebel.

New bodycam footage of Almansoori’s arrest was released Sunday, showing the moment the alleged murderer was captured after fleeing to Arizona.

The images show Arizona police officers training their guns on the suspect as they take him out of his car and handcuff him.

His arrest set off a political face-off between Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg and Maricopa County Attorney Rachel Mitchell.

Mitchell has vowed to try to block the extradition of Almansoori to New York until after he’s tried in Arizona, saying that Bragg is too soft on crime to be entrusted with the suspect.

“Having observed the treatment of violent criminals in the New York area by the Manhattan DA there, Alvin Bragg, it’s safer to keep him here and keep him in custody so he can’t be out doing this to individuals either in our state or county or the United States,” Mitchell, a Republican running for re-election, previously said.

The issue of extradition was not a major focus of the hearing.

“I am not making a determination about the bail and his eligibility, therefore, based on any information related to a separate proceeding in New York City, it’s a totally separate proceeding,” the court commissioner said. “I’m only making a decision about this case today. So that’s my decision about this case.”

Bragg has blasted Mitchell for trying to block the extradition.

The city’s poverty rate jumped to 23% from 18% between 2021 and 2022, with the number of residents struggling to make ends meet climbing to 2 million from 1.5 million. The increase marks the largest single-year increase in at least a decade, with profound implications for children.

The report was the latest reminder of the lingering economic impacts of the pandemic and other challenges the city continues to face as federal aid programs ended while the underlying issues remained.

“Our city is in the midst of an affordability crisis,” Richard Buery, CEO of Robin Hood, said in a statement. “Alarmingly, this year’s annual Poverty Tracker report observes the sharpest one-year increase in poverty we’ve found since launching the study in 2012.”

Researchers surveyed a representative sample of 3,000 New York households every three months over the course of the study. Among their chilling findings, the latest poverty rate was double the national average, as federal policy changes were exacerbated locally by record-high rent and inflation.

Several programs that eased conditions for many, including stimulus payments and the expanded Child Tax Credit, ended after the pandemic. This contributed to the growing poverty rate, researchers found.

The problem was even more staggering for the city’s youngest residents. The child poverty rate increased to 25% from 15% — to one in four children — during the study.

Buery described the trend as “particularly disturbing,” after years of pandemic-era policies had brought the city’s child poverty rates to record lows. Policy fixes like tax credits, and housing and child-care vouchers, can help millions of New Yorkers leave hardship behind, he said. But Congress failed to extend benefits like the temporary Child Tax Credit enhancement after the emergency ended.

“We have lacked the will to keep these policies in force,” said Buery.

More than half of the city’s population either lives in poverty or is “low-income” and facing challenges to make ends meet, according to the report. And it’s possible the data have only continued to worsen since 2022.

Representatives of the Grand Street Settlement, a social services provider, said needs have continued to increase over the past year with the arrival of more asylum seekers.

“There are long lines for securing a box from our food pantry on a regular basis,” said Nina Piros, senior early childhood director. “We’ve seen a need for things like diapers and formula.”

The organization is advocating for an expansion of child care that would make more resources available for children and help parents stay in or reenter the workforce.

Daycare assistance for parents

“The news is certainly grim,” said Christopher Wimer, director of the Center on Poverty and Social Policy at Columbia University. “But if there is a silver lining it is that recent years have proven that well-designed policies can and do reduce poverty dramatically. We know what works, it’s just a matter of doing it.”

The report recommended the expansion of local, state and federal aid.

Charles Lutvak, a spokesman for Mayor Adams, pointed to an array of city initiatives aimed at youth employment, job creation and social services, plus an expanded tax credit, as steps forward for the city.

“Under the Adams administration, New York City is working better for working people, with a record number of private-sector jobs and all of the nearly 1 million jobs lost during the pandemic recovered more than a year ahead of projections and two years ahead of projections for the rest of the state,” Lutvak said.

While, by many metrics, it seems New York City has surged back from the pandemic, many of the city’s residents are making less than they were before and income disparities between the city’s richest and poorest have grown.

The crook first asked about buying the flowers at Ortega Flowers at East Gun Hill Road and Jerome Ave. in Norwood on Monday evening — just days after Valentine’s — cops said. He was told they cost about $10.

“He said to me, ‘Gimme, because I’m not going to pay you,'” Oscar Rodriguez told the Daily News on Tuesday, speaking in Spanish.

Rodriguez lives in the area and helps his sister Maria Ortega, 42, several times a week at the flower stall.

The clerk opened the door to confront him, but the thief was standing in the way.

The man then shoved the 39-year-old worker to the ground.

“When I fell, he took the opportunity to grab the flowers,” Rodriguez said. “Then I reacted. I had scissors, and well, I was going to hurt him. He didn’t leave me much time. When he stepped out, he put his hand in his bag and he pulled out two or three — I couldn’t see very well — but he pulled out some bullets.

“He said, ‘These are for you.'”

The robber also lifted his shirt, displaying a firearm tucked into his waistband.

The clerk said would he have chased the man down with his scissors but stopped after the thief made the menacing firearm display.

The robber ran off with the bouquet as the startled worker yelled after him.

“They need to capture him, because this is very bad,” Rodriguez said. “It’s not fair because there are a lot of good people who work hard, work from the early morning until night. They work for their food everyday and to pay their bills, they wake up early… it’s just not right.”

Cops arrived within minutes and, with Rodriguez, scoured the streets for the perp to no avail.

Police released surveillance footage of the suspect and are asking for the public’s help identifying and tracking him down.

Maria Ortega, who usually runs the shop, is relieved that she and her son, who frequently joins her, weren’t there when the man approached.

“Women don’t have the strength to fight a man,” she said. “So I don’t know what would have happened if I had been here. I have been here for a long time, for two years, I’ve been in this location and nobody has disrespected me. Everyone knows me here, I respect them, and they respect me.”

Ortega’s son often comes to the stall and does his homework after school, his family said.

“I’m a little angry. As Hispanics, we are in a country full of opportunities to fight, to help our families move forward,” Ortega said. “This is not fair, that’s not fair.”

Anyone with information about the gunman is asked to call Crime Stoppers at 1-800-577-TIPS.

“Ah, my God,” suspect Kelvin Serita Arocha, 19, sighed in Spanish, tilting his head towards the ceiling as another suspect, Yorman Reveron, 24, was led away in handcuffs from the hearing in Manhattan Supreme Court.

All five are Rikers Island-bound: Arocha was held on $15,000 cash bail, Reveron had his bail set at $100,000, and Darwin Andres Gomez-Izquiel, 19, is held on a $50,000 bail. A fourth suspect, Yohenry Brito, 24, had his previous $15,000 bail reset ahead of a hearing next week to determine the source of his bail funds.

Those four suspects all face varying assault charges.

A fifth suspect, Wilson Juarez, 21, had his bail set to $1 and was charged only with a count of tampering with physical evidence. Bail of $1 is sometimes imposed on suspects who might be detained on other serious matters, such as under federal immigration laws.

Two more suspects in the incident were arraigned on the same grand jury indictment earlier this week.

“The seven defendants indicted have now appeared in court, and because of our thorough investigation we can present our case and hold them fully accountable for their actions,” Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg said in a statement.

“Our investigation into the incident with the NYPD remains ongoing and we are working with our law enforcement partners to apprehend the remaining individuals involved.”

The Jan. 27 alleged assault on the officers set off a wave of national media attention and anti-migrant outcry, even as new body cam footage from the incident emerged that appeared to contradict the NYPD’s initial account that migrants had antagonized first.

But developments since the night of the attack — the bodycam footage, false rumors that some of the suspects had fled out of state and a change in approach from the DA’s office — have complicated and brought up questions about the case.

Several of the men’s attorneys noted the DA’s office initially did not ask for bail for most of the suspects in earlier court hearings.

The DA’s office’s stance on bail in the case has changed. At Friday’s hearing, Assistant District Attorney Neil Greenwell asked Supreme Court Judge Ruth Pickholz for up to $100,000 cash bail against some of the suspects.

Reveron, wearing a suit jacket, has received “numerous death threats,” according to his lawyer, to the point where his family, who are also in New York City, were afraid to come to court.

“There were also some reports that Mr. Reveron had fled on the bus,” his lawyer said. “Mr. Reveron has been in contact with me every day. He video-called me to show me that he was in New York City.”

Mark Macron, attorney for one of the migrants, brought up in court that after his client, Gomez-Izquiel, was first arrested, he was allowed to walk free. On Friday, prosecutors asked for bail to be set to $100,000.

“The change in circumstances has not been that great…” Macron said. “They’re responding to pressure.”

Bragg faced sharp criticism after deciding not to request bail for most of the men arrested in the attack.

Brito, whose interaction with the NYPD officers ignited the brawl, was also brought back into custody. Previously, a judge had set a bail of $15,000. Brio was freed after his bail was reportedly paid by a Brooklyn church group. A hearing is set for next week to determine the source of Brio’s bail funds.

“I think this was a situation where the people were surprised that the bail was posted,” Mark Jankowitz, Brito’s lawyer, said, referring to the DA’s office. Jankowitz added that prosecutors hadn’t asked for a hearing before Brito was allowed out of detention.

Brito was accompanied in court by immigration advocates. Jankowitz said that he was staying at the home of one of the advocates.

Juarez and Arocha were taken into ICE custody. Juarez was in ICE custody because he mistakenly missed a court date in Texas after relocating to New York, said his lawyer, Adrienne Edward. Juarez’s legal status in the U.S. is unclear, Edward said.

“Since this incident has taken place, his image has been splashed all over the news,” said Edward. She added: “Mr. Juarez was never involved in any physical altercation and unfortunately the same picture continues to get published.”

Juarez was charged with evidence tampering because he allegedly swapping jackets with others involved in the assault. He is not charged with participating in the attack itself.

According to Edward, Juarez came to the U.S. to work and send money home to support his mother and 2-year-old child.

Arocha’s lawyer, Michael Hurwitz, asked the judge to set bail to $1 so that the migrant could be placed into Department of Corrections custody, instead of remaining in ICE custody. Hurwitz said that if Arocha is placed in ICE custody, he could be deported before the criminal case is resolved. The judge instead set Arocha’s bail at $15,000.

“I think it’s undisputed that physical contact in this case was initiated by a police officer. That’s clear on this video,” Hurwitz said.

Two other suspects were arraigned before Friday’s hearing. Yarwuin Madris was arraigned on the indictment on Wednesday, and Ulises Bohorquez was arraigned on Thursday. They were not named in the original indictment.

“The DA in the case should’ve requested bail” earlier in the proceeding, Police Benevolent Association President Patrick Hendry told reporters afterward. “The judge should have kept them behind bars but yet, they were let back on the street to cause havoc.”

The site of the funeral marked a remarkable choice. In 1989, thousands stormed the Manhattan cathedral in opposition to the Catholic Church’s policies on homosexuality, HIV/AIDS and abortion.

“Seeing all the people at the funeral services, and all the love I’ve received from people in her community all over the world, is a testament of how awesome Cecilia was,” said Gentili’s partner, Peter Scotto. “I’m so grateful for them all. She was an angel, an icon, a mother, an educator, a leader, and so much to so many people.”

Catholics have long excluded queer and transgender people, and the national conference of Catholic bishops in the U.S. rejects the concept of gender transition.

However, the Vatican announced in October the church would allow trans people to be baptized and serve as godparents under some circumstances.

“How do we articulate the gravity of this loss?” said Adam Eli, an organizer and friend of Gentili’s who helped to put together the funeral. “I do think that having the funeral there, in a space that is so historic and such a heavy-hitter, really positions her as the saint that she was.”

Gentili, a trans woman, cemented her status as a major LGBTQ+ activist through her work to improve access to gender-affirming healthcare, HIV treatment, sex workers rights, housing and immigration legal help.

Río Sofia, who lived on a shared property with Gentili and looked up to her as a mother figure, wore a red dress with flowers made of $100 bills to the funeral.

“She was an absolute icon, a revolutionary and she will live forever in our hearts,” Sofia said of Gentili.

Sofia recounted how Gentili gave her away at her wedding — to date, one of her fondest life memories.

“She gave me a gift that I never thought that I could have: A wedding to another trans person in a room full of trans people,” Sofia, a visual artist and organizer, said. “And she knew that it’s something that we deserved.”

Gentili was a Catholic who attended Catholic services, as well as Baptist services, during her life. The funeral arrangements were announced at a memorial service for the activist last week.

“There was definitely a gay gasp in the room, but in the best way possible, a very excited murmur through the crowd,” Eli said of the announcement.

Every Catholic in the Archdiocese is entitled to a Catholic funeral, said Joseph Zwilling, director of communications for the Archdiocese of New York.

Kymm Savage, 29, was also in attendance. Savage, a trans woman, migrated from Jamaica to New York with her family of four. Gentili was an inspiration and beacon of kindness and comfort as Savage was sorting out her immigration status, she said.

“She’s everything to the community in terms of who we think a savior should look like,” said Savage, a human rights activist. “And I think that’s why everyone is referring to her as a saint, because she really did show up for you. And people will remember her showing up forever and overcoming all the obstacles.”

Gentili founded Trans Equity Consulting, a New York City-based firm that offers guidance to the LGBTQ community and has a healthcare clinic at Callen Lorde, a center for LGBTQ+ healthcare. Previously, she was director of policy at Gay Men’s Health Crisis.

Gentili frequently shared her life story as she sought to empower others.

She was born in Argentina and came to the United States in 2000, seeking to to make a new start after being sexually abused throughout her childhood. Undocumented, she turned to sex work to make a living.

Gentili was homeless, addicted to heroin and was arrested repeatedly for prostitution — before accessing recovery services and eventually gaining legal status as an asylum seeker.

She released her first book in 2022 and performed an autobiographical Off-Broadway show called “Red Ink” in 2023.

Wearing a black puffer jacket, Ulises Bohorquez, 21, pleaded not guilty to assault charges before he was led away in handcuffs.

He allegedly kicked and grabbed one of two NYPD officers whom a group of migrants piled on outside a migrant shelter on W. 42nd St. the night of Jan. 27, bruising the cop’s body and cutting his nose.

Out of seven suspects previously arraigned in criminal court, Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg’s office only asked for bail to be set for one man, enraging police and raising the temperature of the city’s already heated debate over migrants.

“Frankly it’s nowhere near the culpability of some of these other defendants and some of these defendants … were released,” Bohorquez’s defense lawyer Brian Hutchinson argued before Judge Laura Ward. “I’m well aware, as everyone in the city is, with what has gone on here since the original arraignment in the case. We’re simply asking for equal treatment of the defendant.”

Hutchinson also noted that his client sustained a broken wrist during the attack.

With about a dozen cops watching inside the courtroom, bail was set at $100,000.

After the hearing, Hutchinson called the bail amount “excessive” and said, “This is a reaction to what’s happening with the story.”

Last week, police bodycam footage of the incident was released that appeared to contradict initial accounts from NYPD brass.

They’d claimed that a migrant man had been confrontational with the officers. But the video appeared to show him starting to comply with an order to stop blocking a sidewalk, then getting grabbed by the scruff of the neck and thrown up against a wall as he retrieved a baby stroller. The chaos ensued after that.

Police Benevolent Association President Patrick Hendry applauded Thursday’s decision to hold Bohorquez on bail.

“This should have been from the beginning, from the first four who were released on their own recognizance — that should have never happened,” he told reporters. “They should’ve bailed like this.

“So we’re happy but we’re going to continue to be in these courtrooms to make sure that every single individual who participated in this vicious gang assault is held accountable and behind bars.”

Bohorquez was arrested onWednesday at the New Ebony Hotel in Central Harlem, prosecutors said.

They noted that, in a review of his social media, they found photos of him holding weapons.

“There are Congress members who send out Christmas cards with pictures of them holding firearms,” Hutchinson retorted, an apparent reference to notorious cards from pols including Rep. Lauren Boebert of Colorado.

Bohorquez, who had a previous bench warrant for not showing up to a court date, will be back in court April 2. He faces a maximum sentence of seven years in prison for his latest charges.

According to ICE spokesperson Marie Ferguson, two other men involved in the Jan. 27 assault — Kelvin Servita-Arocha, 19, and Wilson Omar Juarez-Aguilarte, 21 — were arrested and taken into custody on Tuesday.

They’ve both been identified as members of Tren de Aragua, a powerful Venezuelan gang.

“Both unlawfully present Venezuelan citizens have been charged in conjunction with the violent gang assault carried out on two NYPD officers and are currently detained without bond in ERO New York City custody,” Ferguson said in a statement.

Five others who’ve been indicted in the Times Square incident, including Servita-Arocha, Wilson Juarez, Yohenry Brito, Yorman Reveron and Darwin Andres Gomez-Izquiel, are expected to be arraigned on Friday.

Just hours earlier, former President Donald Trump raged against migrants before his own court date in the same building.

“Migrants are trying to beat up our police officers,” he told reporters. They’re trying to do things that we’ve never seen before. We are going to have a problem with — I call it Biden migrant crime. They’re doing things that nobody’s ever seen before.”

With Molly Crane-Newman