NYPD officer, 31, is shot in the back while on plainclothes patrol in the Bronx, with suspect, 24, taken into custody as city tallies THIRD shooting of police officer in three months
A New York Police Department officer was shot in the back late Tuesday as he patrolled the Bronx as part of an anti-gun violence unit.
The 31-year-old officer, whose name hasn’t been released, was in plain clothes and was shot in the lower back, the NYPD said, as he chased after an armed suspect, the New York Times reported.
The shooting, which occurred around 10:30 p.m. in the Soundview section of the Bronx, marks the third shooting of a New York police officer in the last three months, according to the Times.
Police investigated into the early morning hours of Wednesday, looking for evidence after an 31-year-old NYPD officer was shot while pursuing a suspect
Police Chief Dermot F. Shea said at an early Wednesday news conference at the hospital where the officer was being treated that the officer was expected to survive.
He was wearing a bullet-proof vest, but was shot below the vest and is in ‘significant pain’, Shea said.
The 24-year-old suspect from Tuesday’s shooting was in custody, police sources said. He wasn’t named, but police said he had an arrest record in New York and in New Jersey.
Fellow officers transported the shot officer to a nearby hospital in the Bronx. A large group of them investigated at the scene into the early Wednesday hours
Officers showed up in force to investigate the shooting of their fellow NYPD officer, an incident that marked the third shooting of an NYPD officer in as many months
New York City Mayor Bill deBlasio visited the hospital, the Times reported.
‘He’s someone who goes out and puts his life on the line to protect other people in the most powerful way, by depriving criminals of their firearms,’ deBlasio said. ‘Anyone who wants an example of how hard the N.Y.P.D. works, how committed our officers are, you see it this evening in the Bronx’.
Fellow officers took the officer, who has been on the force for more than six years, to Jacobi Hospital in the Bronx.
He was in stable condition early Wednesday.