NEW YORK (1010 WINS) – The husband of an off-duty NYPD officer barricaded himself in a Queens home with her and shot at police Tuesday morning before she was able to escape through a window and he was apprehended, authorities said.
The husband was shot in the right shoulder by police during the standoff near 133rd Avenue and 129th Street in South Ozone Park. His wife is believed to have suffered a broken leg as she jumped from a second-floor window of the home. No officers were injured.
At a press conference shortly before noon, NYPD Chief of Department Rodney Harrison said police got a 911 call around 8:40 a.m. from the off-duty officer, who said she needed help at the home.
Responding officers knocked on the front door and “engaged the suspect in conversation” before he “threatened to shoot” them, Harrison said.
The officers backed out and called the NYPD’s Emergency Service Unit, which responded in a few minutes, according to Harrison.
Citizen App video shows helicopters circling above the neighborhood and ESU vehicles in the area.
As police were trying to engage in dialog with the husband, he shot “several times” at officers, Harrison said.
The wife was eventually able to jump out of a second-floor window, according to Harrison, who said her husband shot towards her and ESU personnel as she escaped.
Officers returned fire and the husband retreated inside the home, Harrison said.
At some point during the standoff, the husband’s brother arrived and officers had to “grab him to keep him from running into the active crime scene,” according to police.
The brother “calmed down” and worked with the hostage negotiation team to get the husband out of the home, said NYPD Det. Brenda Reddick, who took part in the negotiations.
Harrison said the husband “voluntarily came to the door and was placed under arrest.”
The husband and wife were taken to an area hospital for their injuries.
Harrison credited the officers at the scene, saying, “This could have easily gone the wrong direction, but with the great work of our hostage negotiation team, our ESU, we were able to make an apprehension.”
Harrison specifically commended Reddick for the successful apprehension.
“It felt really good,” Reddick told reporters at the press conference. “Honestly it felt really good. Although there was someone that did get shot, no one lost their life, and that’s what’s most important.”
Harrison said police believe the off-duty officer’s service revolver was the gun fired by her husband during the standoff. He said an investigation is ongoing and that all the information was preliminary.
The NYPD urged people to avoid the area of 133rd Avenue and 129th Street amid the investigation.
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