Sad city

A 36-year-old livery-cab driver was shot to death in Brooklyn early yesterday just moments after he called his longtime companion on his cellphone to say that two young men walking toward him appeared threatening.

The victim, Mohammad N. Bhuiyan, told his companion, Janet M. Alston, 38, that two young men were walking up the block. “I think they’re going to rob me,” Ms. Alston said Mr. Bhuiyan told her.

Suddenly, the phone connection was lost, Ms. Alston said. She called Mr. Bhuiyan back, but he had already been attacked and shot. She heard him say, “Oh, they shot me, they shot me,” she said, and then he went silent.

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As Ms. Alston spoke yesterday, she stood outside the home that she and Mr. Bhuiyan shared on East 52nd Street in Brooklyn, and her eyes became moist with tears. She said that Mr. Bhuiyan came to the United States about 12 years ago from Bangladesh and that they had been together for about eight years. She said they had four children together, ranging in age from 9 months to 7 years.

In the past, Ms. Alston said, Mr. Bhuiyan had mentioned to her that he worried about being robbed.

“He was just a very good guy,” she said.