Lunging suspect shot by cops during confrontation

Officers shot a Harlem man in the hip after he lunged at them during a confrontation in the hallway of his parents’ apartment building Tuesday, NYPD sources said.

Cops were responding to a 911 call about a man with a gun when they spotted Michael Cordero, 34, in a fourthfloor hallway inside a building on W. 114th St., between Frederick Douglass and Adam Clayton Powell Blvds., at 5:48 p.m., sources said.

Cordero initially refused to pull his hands out of his pockets — and when he did, he lunged at the officers, making what looked like a gun-cocking motion, sources said.

“Suddenly the subject stated that he had a gun, took a shooting stance and pointed an object at the officers,” NYPD Chief of Patrol Rodney Harrison said Tuesday night.

The lunge was recorded on an officer’s body-worn camera, sources said.

“You’d have shot him, too,” said one high-ranking police source.

One of the responding officers fired three times, from about 15 to 20 feet away, and a bullet punched into Cordero’s hip and exited his body through his buttock, Harrison said. Police recovered a knife from Cordero’s pocket, sources said.

Medics took Cordero to St. Luke’s Hospital, where he’s expected to recover, sources said.

Cordero’s family has already retained civil rights lawyer Sanford Rubenstein. Prior to word of police finding a knife at the scene, Rubenstein told the Daily News, “We are conducting an independent investigation with regard to what actually happened here – an unarmed man being shot by police.”

Neighbor Jay Thompson, who lives across the hall on the fourth floor, agreed.

“He was unarmed. They messed up,” Thompson said. He peeked out of his door to see two uniformed officers in the hallway, he said.

Thompson described Cordero as quiet and said he didn’t bother his neighbors, though another building resident described him as mentally ill.

“He was coming to visit his parents. He’s schizophrenic. If he’s not on his meds he acts out,” said Latoya Jenkins, 31, a department store manager who also lives in the building. “They’ve come for him before, but this time they shot him.”

Cordero was arrested twice in December for domestic-violence-related incidents.