Crimebuster’s parting words: ‘Take pride!’
HE’S RETIRING UNDER A good sign.
The head of the NYPD’s Joint Terrorism Task Force — who famously caught the city’s Zodiac killer in 1996 — accepted a ceremonial Tommy gun as he walked out of his command in Chelsea for the last time Wednesday afternoon.
More than a hundred well-wishers crowded around Deputy Chief Joe Herbert, 60, to see him off after 37 years in the NYPD.
Herbert was a member of a task force formed to catch a murderous copycat of the notorious San Francisco Zodiac killer who was terrorizing Queens and Brooklyn in the 1990s. He arrested Heriberto (Eddie) Seda during a tense hostage standoff in 1996, then recognized Seda’s handwriting as the serial killer’s when he saw a confession signed with an upside-down cross.
“A very calm feeling came over me, a very calm sensation, because I knew we had him, but I knew there was a lot of work to do yet,” he said of building the case.
Herbert, who was tapped to lead the Joint Terrorism Task Force in 2014, on Tuesday offered this advice new police recruits looking to make their marks:
“Take pride in your job. Take pride in what you do. Document as much as you can, whether in your memo book, on the summons . . . If you go the court, and you tell the district attorney you’ll do something, or if the district attorney asks you to do something, do it.”