Family recounts loud music clash with neighbor that got Bronx father killed: ‘It just went too far’

A Bronx father who was killed in an early-morning dispute over loud music with a neighbor last week was stabbed in the back as he was walking away, a relative said on Monday.

Tyquen Pleasant and his fiancée had a baby boy just a month earlier and shared a 4-year-old girl who had to get up for school in just a few hours on the day of the killing.

Pleasant, 27, was just trying to get a little peace and quiet when he confronted his neighbor about the noise, his aunt said.

“My nephew has a 5-week-old baby and a 4-year-old girl he was planning on taking to school the next day,” the victim’s aunt, Kawanna Pleasant, told the Daily News.

The victim “was … just trying to protect his family, just trying to ask a neighbor, ‘Hey, I just want some peace. I just want to go to sleep at 1:30 in the morning,” she added.

Cops said Pleasant was stabbed after clashing with Shaun Pyles, 25, who lived across the hallway in a second-floor apartment in the Elsmere Place building near Marmion Ave. in East Tremont.

Police found Pleasant lying in the hallway on the second floor, stabbed in the back. Medics rushed him to St. Barnabas Hospital, but he could not be saved. Besides his girlfriend, he leaves behind the two children, Boggs said.

Pyles, a transgender woman, went back into her apartment and waited for police to take her into custody, neighbors said. Responding officers found her sitting on her couch.

The 25-year-old suspect was arrested at the scene and charged later Friday with murder, manslaughter and criminal possession of a weapon, police said. The murder weapon, a large knife, was recovered.

“It just went too far,” the victim’s aunt said. “For my nephew to argue with this person, and then he turns his back and is stabbed in the back like a coward.

“My nephew was walking away,” she added. “It’s not right.”

Pleasant’s fiancée Jayvonna Rucker said she saw the attack unfold while her children were sleeping.

“My daughter was inside the living room sleeping,” said Rucker, 25. “The baby had just gone to sleep. We were about to go to bed, and all of a sudden we just heard a loud vibration sound coming through the wall.”

Rucker said Pleasant got up, got dressed and went to the door and began arguing with the neighbor. Then she saw her fiancée get stabbed.

“So I’m trying to bring him into my apartment, and he’s just laying there,” she said. Rucker called 911 and performed CPR until an ambulance arrived.

“I’m checking the pulse, and I don’t feel nothing,” she said. “I just knew he was gone. I just saw blood. It was all over my feet, my hands. I’ve been trying to scrub the blood off my nails still.”

Rucker said they had made complaints to 311 and building management about the neighbor’s noise, but nothing changed.

“It’s been like three or four months,” she said.

Rucker said she wants to see Pleasant’s killer punished, but right now she has to be strong for her kids.

“It hurts so bad. My son is only 1 month old, and he didn’t get to have the memories he’s supposed to have with his dad,” she said. “My daughter’s finally understanding that he’s not going to be with us anymore. That’s kind of hard on me.”