When Junior Sharpe’s wife brought their elderly neighbor dinner on Sunday evening, they never thought she’d wander outside afterward.
But 90-year-old Doreen Ellis, who had dementia, according to family and neighbors, unexpectedly left her Crown Heights apartment at some point overnight and walked halfway down the block.
Ellis somehow got into the backyard of another building on New York Avenue near Sterling Place, where she was discovered dead in the snow Monday morning. She was wearing only her blue nightgown, a headscarf and one sock, Sharpe said, and a small white shawl lay on the ground next to her.
“She had done that [wandered out] before, but this was in the summertime. Being that it’s cold, you don’t think that somebody will go outside,” he said. “She just got lost.”
Ellis was one of at least 10 people citywide who died outside or shortly after being found there amid frigid temperatures since Saturday, officials said. Mayor Zohran Mamdani said city medical examiners are still looking into the causes of death, noting several of the people had previous interactions with local homeless services. His administration is urging New Yorkers to keep an eye out for anyone exposed to the cold as the forecast calls for below-freezing temperatures into next week.
“We don’t yet know whether every case will be ruled hypothermia, but we need every New Yorker to be on alert, looking out for their neighbors,” Mamdani said at a press conference Tuesday. “This is the coldest weather conditions that we have experienced in this city for eight years.”
The mayor added that city workers as well as faith and advocacy groups are boosting homeless outreach. He said his administration is asking hospitals to limit overnight discharges to ensure patients aren’t sent out into the cold without a place to go.
A chair neighbors say Doreen Ellis, 90, used to sit on outside her building in Crown Heights.
Brittany Kriegstein / Gothamist
Molly Wasow Park, the city’s commissioner of social services, said Tuesday that outreach workers are focused on a list of about 350 people known to have underlying conditions or are otherwise at higher risk in the cold, and are seeking to check on them every two hours. She declined to provide details about the homeless services history of any of the people who died.
In a statement, the nonprofit Legal Aid Society and the Coalition for the Homeless said the city’s outreach efforts have long been undermined by distrust among homeless New Yorkers, who often associate them with police enforcement and the loss of their belongings.
They added that the city’s current response cannot make up for decades of systemic failure and that what’s most needed, permanent housing and rebuilt trust, will take time to deliver.
Officials said they are also opening warming centers across the city during the extreme cold so people can get out of the elements. New Yorkers can find the closest center to them by calling 311 or visiting the system’s website.
“Extreme weather is not a personal failure, but it is a public responsibility,” Mamdani said. “And we are mobilizing every resource at our disposal to ensure that New Yorkers are brought indoors during this potentially lethal weather event.”
The others found outside who died include men and women in Brooklyn, Manhattan, the Bronx and Queens, according to authorities. Temperatures were in the low teens and felt even colder around the weekend’s winter storm, which left more than a foot of snow in some areas.
Ellis, a great-grandmother who was originally from Trinidad, was a “ like a pillar in the community,” Sharpe said, pointing out the wooden chairs where she sat on her building’s stoop to greet people as they walked by. He said she shared her first-floor apartment with her son and was the building’s longtime landlady before passing the responsibilities onto her children. Property records show she owned the building. Ellis worked as a nurse earlier in her life and was very active in her local church, he added.
Ellis’ nephew Neil Ellis, who lives out of state, said he was devastated by her death. He said her dementia sometimes caused her to wander around the hallway in her building, unable to find her door.
“She was at least halfway there into dementia,” he said in a phone interview. “She could talk to you, but she’d tell you the same thing twice, three times. I just want to know how she got outside.”
The entrance to the building Ellis lived in and owned
Brittany Kriegstein / Gothamist
Emergency management officials said those without reliable heat, as well as older adults, homeless people and people with health issues are at the highest risk of hypothermia and cold-related illness. They are advising residents to limit their time outdoors, dress warmly if they have to go outside and call 311 if they see anyone who looks like they need shelter. Such calls will be routed to 911 during the Code Blue designation for homeless outreach, the mayor said.
Residents can also call 311 if their heat or hot water is not working, officials said.
“This is a prolonged and severe cold event. Taking precautions now matters,” New York City Emergency Management said Tuesday in a post on X. The agency added that the cold stretch could cause pipes to freeze, cars to have trouble starting and roads to become icy, especially on bridges and overpasses.
More than 170 people living outside were placed in shelters and other indoor locations over the weekend, and at least three people were forcibly taken to hospitals out of medical necessity, according to City Hall.
Sharpe said Ellis’ family was still waiting for more information about her death from medical examiners. He urged New Yorkers to look out for their vulnerable neighbors.
“Check on them,” he said. “That’s a horrible way [to die].”
Elizabeth Kim and Andrew Giambrone contributed reporting.
This story has been updated to include comment from the Legal Aid Society and the Coalition for the Homeless.
