HOPPY B’DAY
Cops leap into action, deliver Easter baby
TWO COPS helped deliver an Easter baby inside a parked car on the Upper East Side.
Officers Stephan Koustoubardis and Vincent Ching had just started their shift around 8 a.m. Sunday when a 911 call came in about a woman in labor at 92nd St. near York Ave. — and it wasn’t an April Fool’s joke.
“We were flagged down by her husband, who was already with her in the driver side of the vehicle, pretty much delivering the baby, in labor, at that moment,” Koustoubardis said.
Moments before, the husband, Philip Crotty, had attempted to drive his wife, Kelly, from their 93rd St. home to NYU Langone Medical Center.
But their baby girl wasn’t waiting.
“We got about five blocks. We were about to get on the (FDR) Drive, and my wife said, ‘Pull over, something’s happening,’” Crotty told the Daily News. So he called 911. “I could see that the baby was crowning, and I got her on her back, and within a couple of minutes, the baby was in my hands,” Crotty said.
By then, two cops from the 19th Precinct arrived and took over.
“I actually stepped in and assisted the husband and took care of the rest of the delivery with him,” said Koustoubardis, 29.
Ching, 25, who has only been on the force for eight months, ran to get towels and blankets.
“It feels fantastic. Honestly, it’s a natural-high feeling of being happy in life,” said Koustoubardis, an eight-year NYPD veteran. And it was “even better” it happened on Easter.
“It was very uplifting. As police officers, we don’t normally handle these kinds of situations, and it feels great to help directly to bring a new life into this world,” Ching said.
The cops visited the proud parents, both 37, their 3-yearold son, Emmett — and their newborn daughter, Clare — at NYU Langone on Sunday afternoon, bearing NYPD sweatshirts and tiny police shields.
“They were great,” Philip Crotty said.