Off-duty cop recalls attack

The off-duty cop whose face was bashed by a random attacker in Brooklyn says he would have turned the tables if his assailant hadn’t ambushed him.

“He got me from behind. Otherwise it would have been different,” the 29-yearold officer told the Daily News, speaking on condition of anonymity. “I had my gun.”

The officer, a rookie who joined the NYPD last year, was walking his golden retriever along William Court and E. 11th St. in Sheepshead Bay just before 9 a.m. on Thursday when the man jumped him, screaming at him in Russian.

“All he kept saying is, ‘I’m going to f—k you up, I’m going to f—k you up,’ ” said the officer, who needed stitches on both sides of his face after the attack.

He doesn’t know the attacker, he said. He gave investigators the man’s description, and the NYPD released a sketch Sunday. “He got me here, here and here,” the officer said, pointing to the cuts on his face. “I have a broken cheek.”

The officer’s mother and neighbors expressed shock that the attack could happen in a quiet neighborhood.

“This is a good part of Brooklyn. It doesn’t happen here. He works in Brownsville. Every time he comes home safe, I feel a relief,” the mother said, sighing.

Neighbor Arthur Asriyan, 52, a computer engineer, said he’s known the officer since he was 5. “He is a neighborhood kid that will never say no if anybody needs his help. He is that guy,” he said. “He’s just a regular kid, a very good kid.”

As for he attack, he said, “It just doesn’t happen in this area.”

The officer feels safe with his NYPD colleagues on the case — “we have the best Police Department in the world,” he said.

But he had a fatalistic outlook about the attack itself. “What are you going to do? We live in Brooklyn. S--t happens,” he said.