Neighbors on a dead-end road in Shawangunk were shocked to discover that a suspected murder took place in their quaint community early Tuesday morning.

At 5 a.m., January 11, NYS Troopers responded to a reported shooting on Vinegar Hill Road, in Shawangunk. Upon their arrival, they found the victim of an apparent shooting dead outside of a nearby residence. By 11 a.m., numerous Trooper cars, and other law enforcement vehicles, lined the edge of the ice-crusted street as a covered corpse could be seen being wheeled away.

That same day, they took a suspect into custody. Troopers arrested 26-year-old Shawangunk resident Walter D. Post Jr., charging him with murder in the second degree, a felony, before sending him to the Ulster County Jail, according to a NYS Trooper press release issued Wednesday.

Later on Wednesday, Ellenville Justice Matthew Parker confirmed that Post was arraigned at the Ellenville courthouse, and that the victim was a man named Michael Hankins, of Woodridge. Post will have a preliminary hearing at the village courthouse on Friday at 11 a.m., but the trial will take place at the county level, Parker added.

Residents of Vinegar Hill Road described their neighborhood as a peaceful place to live, with families raising children beneath towering pine trees in the now snow-caked landscape. Aside from the cars that populate it, the road is mostly quiet. However, that perception shifted this morning; and, like the road's namesake, the incident has left a bitter taste in the residents’ mouths.

“It’s pretty scary because it’s where we live,” said Joanne Cerniglia, who has lived just a few hundred feet from the, now, crime scene for 17 years. “It’s not something you anticipate happening in your neighborhood.”

At around 1:30 a.m. this morning, Allan Spear, who lives on Vinegar Hill Road, was awoken by a mysterious sound.

“It sounded like a muffled boom,” Spear described. “But we hear it all the time, so I didn’t think anything of it.”

The night before, Spear noticed a white sedan parked outside of his house with another vehicle, which he couldn’t describe, parked alongside it. Based on a screenshot from Spear’s home-security camera that was aimed towards the road, the sedan was parked in the opposite direction of the dead-end on Vinegar Hill Road like it was headed towards County Road 7.

When he woke at 6:30 a.m. on Tuesday, his long-time girlfriend was ushering her son out the door to get to school. Spears then watched law enforcement stop the boy and tell him to put his hands up before frisking him for weapons. When Spear decided to check his cameras again, he saw the same white sedan parked in the same spot. This time, a body bag lay next to it.

Kevin Dunleavy, a nearby neighbor of over 40 years, said he noticed the commotion and tail lights outside of his house early in the morning. It was the only noise he heard all day. Even if he heard a boom, he wouldn’t think much of it. The area is home to many hunters, Dunleavy explained. An unexpected pop wouldn’t have made him flinch.

“It makes me sad,” Dunleavy said. “It’s a loss to the neighborhood and the human race. People killing people ain’t good.”

Down the road, another neighbor, who didn’t want to share their name, was awoken to a phone call from their sister who worried that they may have been the victim. It made this resident think back to 1998, when they accidentally left a window open and a thief hopped in. Thankfully the two never interacted, but in light of Tuesday’s event, they realized that scary things could happen on the secluded road without anyone noticing.

“You think [because] you live out here that you’re removed from it all, but you’re not,” they said.

As law enforcement officials prepare a clear narrative, facts and rumors are mixing and details are being passed from neighbor to neighbor like a game of telephone. Some claimed that the booms were gunshots and between one and five shots were taken, depending on who you talk to. According to one source, which has not yet been confirmed by authorities, an ex-boyfriend of a female resident drove by and shot a man suspected of being the ex-girlfriend’s new love interest. The truth of the matter has yet to be revealed, but one thing is certain. No one on Vinegar Hill Road fell asleep that night thinking that lives would be taken while they slumbered.

The Shawangunk Journal will keep you updated as more information is released.