NYPD cop "assassinated" sitting in her command trailer
NEW YORK -- A New York police officer who was shot in an "unprovoked attack" while in a marked police command vehicle early Wednesday has died, authorities say.
The New York Police Department tweeted that the officer, a 12-year veteran of the force, was in the vehicle with her partner in the New York City borough of the Bronx. She's been identified as Miosotis Familia, a 48-year-old mother of three, including a set of twins.
Command vehicles are stationary and resemble trailers, police explained.
Police sources told CBS New York the suspect is seen on camera walking out of a bodega, putting his hoodie on, walking up to the passenger side of the vehicle and firing into it. The officer was sitting in the passenger side of the mobile command unit.
"This was an unprovoked direct attack on police officers who were assigned to keep the people of this city safe," Police Commissioner James O'Neill said, calling it an assassination.
Her partner radioed for help.
"Shots fired! 10-85!" the officer is heard frantically shouting after the gunfire, including the code for an officer down. "My partner's shot! My partner's shot! My partner's shot! Hurry up central!"
Other officers confronted the suspect, who was running, a block away. The suspect drew a revolver and the officers fatally shot him, authorities said, adding that a silver revolver was recovered at the scene.
Another person, believed to be a bystander, was also hit by a bullet and was listed in stable condition, police said.
The suspect was identified as 34 year-old Alexander Bonds, of New York, and was on parole for a robbery in Syracuse, New York, police said.
Familia had been stationed in a mobile command post, a RV-sized truck used as a communications hub during major events, like the Fourth of July. She had been looking down, writing in her memo book, a police log where officers record their shift activity, when Bonds walked up.
Bonds, who also went by John Bonds, had been on parole for a robbery case in Syracuse, New York, but was from the Bronx, police said. He is seen in surveillance footage marching up to the post "with purpose," officials said, but it's not clear what provoked the attack.
Police say Familia had no prior contact with Bonds.
In a video posted on Facebook in September, he ranted about the treatment of civilians by officers and talks about how hard life was behind bars. The photos of Bonds posted on the page match a police mugshot.
"Don't think every brother, cousin, uncle you got that get killed in jail is because of a blood or crip or Latin King killing them. Nah, police be killing them and saying that an inmate killed them," he said in the video.
At another point, he said into the camera: "I'm not playing, Mr. Officer. I don't care about 100 police watching this." And: "It's time for people to wisen up."
The shooting recalled the Dec. 20, 2014 killing of patrol officers Wenjian Liu and Rafael Ramos, who were ambushed and shot to death in their vehicle without warning by a man who approached the passenger window of their marked police car. The suspect, 28-year-old Ismaaiyl Brinsley, then fatally shot himself. Brinsley announced online in the moments before the shooting that he was planning to shoot two "pigs" in retaliation for the police chokehold death of Eric Garner.
Mayor Bill de Blasio, speaking at the hospital before she died, asked that the city keep her in their thoughts.
"She was on duty serving this city, protecting people, doing what she believed in and doing the job she loved," he said. "And after this shocking and sudden attack, her fellow officers came to her aid immediately."
Attorney General Jeff Sessions said in a statement Familia was "unjustly targeted and murdered in a cowardly, unprovoked attack."
"She will be remembered for her years of service and for the example of selflessness that she set protecting innocent people on our streets," Sessions said. This murder in cold blood is a tragedy, and sadly it is the latest in a troubling series of attacks on police officers over the past two years."
Officers saluted at attention outside the Bronx hospital as the ambulance and police motorcade escorted Familia's body from the hospital.
"Fully knowing the dangers that she faced, she suited up in uniform every day and stood tall against those who threaten and terrorize the good folks of the Bronx," said Patrolman's Benevolent Association president Patrick Lynch.
Familia lived with her mother and worked the midnight shift in the Bronx. Family and friends said she became an officer to help her community, and her family was heartbroken.
"Put it this way: She'd give you the shirt off her back. She was the sweetest person you ever want to meet," downstairs neighbor Tom Ritter said. He said his son, now 22, played with Familia's children, and she practically "adopted" him.
When he heard that she had been shot, he said, "My heart dropped."
The Bronx neighborhood was blocked off with police tape as officers investigated the deadly shooting. Police were combing for any other surveillance footage and talking to witnesses.
Witness Jay Marzelli told the Daily News of New York he thought the shots Wednesday were fireworks at first.
"I was in this bodega right here on Creston, just getting a sandwich and all of a sudden there was all this running and stuff going on, and I look out probably 40, 50, 60 cops screaming, 'Call a paramedic, clear the block!'" he said. "It looked like there was a riot going on, and two seconds later I hear gunshots, 'Bam, bam,' and then the police officer was just laying there."
