uly 22, 2009
A police officer shot in the face in a shootout in Jersey City last week died early Tuesday, officials said, five days after he and four others were wounded trying to arrest a shotgun-wielding robbery suspect.
The officer, Detective Marc DiNardo, 37, was the son of a retired Jersey City police lieutenant, Paul DiNardo, and a 10-year veteran of the department.
He is survived by his wife, Mary, and three young children: Gwendolyn, 4; Marc Anthony II, 3; and Ella, 1. He would have turned 38 on Wednesday.
The time of death was 9:35 a.m.
Thomas J. Comey, the Jersey City police chief, said on Monday that Detective DiNardo’s death appeared near, adding, “It is now a stark reality that the miracle we were so badly seeking will not come to pass.”
Detective DiNardo, who was promoted to the rank of detective after the shooting, had been the most seriously injured of the five officers. They were part of a predawn siege and shootout on Thursday morning, after a stakeout of a car involved in a June 18 robbery led to two chaotic exchanges of gunfire with the suspect, one outside on the street and one inside a Reed Street apartment building.
The suspect, identified by the authorities as Hassian Hosendove, 32, and his companion, Amanda Anderson, 22, were both killed.
Edward J. De Fazio, the Hudson County prosecutor, said Mr. Hosendove was shot at least 19 times by the police. Mr. DeFazio, who read the synopses of the two autopsy reports, said Ms. Anderson appeared to have been shot twice
He said that six police rounds were fired outside the apartment building and about 50 police rounds were fired inside. Based on a crime-scene investigation conducted by his office, he said that Mr. Hosendove fired a shotgun at the police — three times from outside and seven times from inside the apartment.
Because the authorities took the unusual step of announcing Detective DiNardo’s imminent death while he was still on life support, the intimacy and emotion of his passing was heightened in the hours after the news conference. Chief Comey, who leads an 895-member department, asked the public to “keep him and his family in their prayers, along with the other officers involved, as we are ready to say goodbye to a fallen hero.”
Melissa Bartholomew, a Jersey City police officer and a friend of the DiNardo family, read a statement from the family at the news conference outside the Jersey City Medical Center, where Detective DiNardo had been fighting for his life since Thursday.
“Marc loved the Jersey City Police Department and the city of Jersey City,” Officer Bartholomew said. “He took joy in helping those in need, taking care of the injured and saving lives.”
Three of the officers have been treated and released from Jersey City Medical Center. One other, Officer Michael Camacho, 25, who was shot in the neck, remains at the hospital. He was moved out of the intensive care unit and upgraded from critical to “serious but guarded” condition, hospital officials said.
Officer Camacho, Detective DiNardo and two of the other injured officers are from the Jersey City Police Department, and one, Officer Dennis Mitchell, 35, who was shot in the arm, is from the Port Authority police.
Mayor Jerramiah T. Healy of Jersey City called Detective DiNardo a hero: “You can’t do more than what Marc did — to lay down his life for his brothers and sisters on the Jersey City Police Department, and also for the citizens, the people of Jersey City.”
No comments:
Post a Comment