NEW YORK (1010 WINS/WCBS 880) -- An on-duty revenue collection agent for the MTA shot and critically wounded a menacing man who followed him and his partner through the subway in Brooklyn on Tuesday night, officials said.
The 39-year-old suspect was transported in critical condition to New York-Presbyterian Brooklyn Methodist Hospital, following the shooting at the Union Street station in Park Slope.
The armed transit revenue collector, who is a 21-year veteran with the MTA, was not injured, nor was his partner. Richard Davey, the president of NYC Transit, said the worker “discharged his firearm in the course of his duties.”
The confrontation started around 9 p.m. at the Atlantic Avenue–Barclays Center station, where the revenue collector was standing on an R line platform with his partner, a "revenue electronic maintainer" who fixes MetroCard machines.
While they were waiting for an R train, a man approached, threatened to “beat them up” and grew increasingly “irate” before following them onto the train, said Michael Kemper, the NYPD’s acting chief of Transit.
The apparently unhinged man repeatedly threatened the unarmed maintenance employee as the armed employee tried to calm him down, Kemper said.
When the train got to the Union Street station, the two MTA workers got off the train to avoid the man, but he followed them and continued to menace them, Kemper said. As they reached the mezzanine area, the man advanced at them, so the MTA worker pulled his gun while repeatedly giving commands for him to back up.
“The male failed to comply and threatened to forcibly remove the firearm from the MTA employee,” Kemper said. “During the course of this interaction, the MTA employee fired one round, which struck the male in the chest.”
The NYPD quickly responded to the scene, and EMS transported the suspect to the hospital.
Davey called the shooting a “tragic” incident and said the MTA is cooperating with the NYPD as it investigates. He said there are about 275 armed collection agents, whose job it is to accompany maintenance workers who fix fare machines.
Kemper believes it’s been years since an armed MTA employee shot someone while on-duty. “This is obviously, and fortunately, an unusual occurrence,” he said.
The suspect is known to the NYPD and has prior arrests, Kemper said. It wasn’t immediately known if he has previous “emotional disturbed person” altercations.
No weapon was recovered on the man, and it’s believed he was unarmed, Kemper said.
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