Two New York City police officers were shot Thursday evening while patroling a public housing complex in the Bronx. He met with the family of one of the officers at the hospital where they were being treated. “The girl was brought out on a stretcher first…” “He was bleeding a lot”, she said. “It was really bloody”.
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A police official Friday morning identified the wounded officers as Diara Cruz and her partner, Patrick Espeut.
They asked the men for identification.
One of the officers was grazed in the head and the other was hit in the leg, WCBS radio said.
“There were a lot of gunshots”, the witness said. “I ain’t going back to jail”, Chavis reportedly said before he killed himself.
The suspect then fled into an apartment on a higher floor.
As Chavis opened the door to the seventh floor hallway, the official said, he turned and fired at the officers. Upon entering the apartment he allegedly said, “I’m about to die; get out of the room”. There was also a sawed-off shotgun in a black bag. A female officer, 24, was shot in the stomach.
Police Commissioner Bratton was not at the hospital on Thursday night, but tweeted, “Proud of my officers, hopeful for their speedy recovery, grateful for the many expressions of concern and support on their behalf”.
The officers were expected to survive.
USA health officials on Friday said men who have been to a Zika outbreak region should use condoms if they have sex with a pregnant woman – for the entire duration of the pregnancy.
The officers are assigned to the Housing Bureau and have been on the force for about two years.
Officers responding to the scene say they found him in the apartment dead of an apparently self-inflicted gunshot wound.
Mayor Bill de Blasio was delivering his State of the City address a few miles away in the Bronx when the officers were shot and had highlighted dropping crime in the city.
Col. Timothy LaBarge, the commander of the Stewart Guard’s 105th Airlift Wing told the New York Daily News that Espeut is “a profoundly professional airman … so it doesn’t surprise us at all that he conducted himself with courage and distinction in his duties with the NYPD”. Two officers returned three shots total.
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The avenues around the Melrose Houses were gagged with police vehicles, and helicopters swarmed over the towering open lodging complex Thursday night as cops reacted to the introductory reports of an officer down.
