Current News

/

ArcaMax

Fatal NYPD shooting of Queens teen holding scissors spurs outrage over cops' actions

Graham Rayman, Rocco Parascandola, Elizabeth Keogh and Josephine Stratman, New York Daily News on

Published in News & Features

The NYPD won’t name the officers or how many shots each fired.

The incident is still being investigated and no body-cam footage has yet been released. It’s unclear if the officers have been involved in prior shootings. Neither have been disciplined, a police official said.

Civil rights attorney Joel Berger, who spent nearly a decade as an executive in the New York City Law Department monitoring police misconduct, said the incident “doesn’t add up.”

“Two cops ought to be able to disarm or at least resolve the situation without having to shoot the kid dead,” he added. “It’s a household pair of scissors.”

Berger urged folks suffering mental health crises to not call the police, saying the police should be “the very last resort.”

Advocates say Rozario’s death highlights the potentially devastating consequences of police responses to mental health emergencies.

“Win called 911 in mental distress, but instead of receiving the help he needed, he was shot and killed at his home by police after an altercation,” said Councilwoman Lynn Schulman, who represents Ozone Park. “Instead of a police response, mental health professionals should have been sent to him.”

The Behavioral Health Emergency Assistance Response Division, or B-HEARD, was one solution to this. The program aims to deescalate crises by sending teams of FDNY EMTs, paramedics and social workers to respond to mental health emergencies instead of cops.

“That would be the perfect instance where this health response would come in to deescalate the mental health crisis,” Lowenkron said. “If they felt there was any severe imminent threat of injury then they would call the police in as backup.”

 

Mayor Eric Adams pledged in March 2023 to expand B-HEARD citywide — but rounds of budget cuts have halted any expansion of the program beyond the 31 precincts it currently serves. The city currently has no plans on expanding it, a spokesman said.

The program never reached Ozone Park, where Rozario’s fatal shooting by cops occurred.

“It doesn’t need to be this ultramilitarized, kind of harsh response,” said Jordyn Rosenthal, director of advocacy at Community Access.

Other services, Rosenthal said, are also lacking.

“This is an issue where a Band-Aid fix is not going to make a difference. We need stitches or reconstructive surgery,” Rosenthal said, adding that more mental health services like respite centers and clubhouses are needed.

_____

(With Julian Roberts-Grmela.)

_____


©2024 New York Daily News. Visit at nydailynews.com. Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.

Comments

blog comments powered by Disqus