HIS ‘PRANK’ GOT COP KILLED
Susp: Just making funny rob video, didn’t mean harm
The suspect jailed for murder in the friendly-fire death of a Queens detective claims the tragedy began with an ill-conceived stab at comedy.
Self-proclaimed “shock value comic” Christopher Ransom, 27, told the Daily News in a jailhouse interview that his alleged Feb. 12 robbery attempt at a TMobile store was actually a phony holdup videotaped by a pal and meant to get laughs online.
“It was a prank gone horribly wrong,” claimed Ransom in the Rikers Island sitdown. “I never meant to hurt anyone or rob anyone … I feel bad for the detective’s family and I hope the sergeant recovers soon.”
Detective Brian Simonsen was mortally wounded when cops fired 42 shots after responding to the reported Richmond Hills robbery. The seven cops arrived to find Ransom inside, clutching a replica Colt handgun and running toward them.
Ransom, shot eight times in the NYPD fusillade, limped out for the interview in his gray prison uniform, looking calm and smiling as he spoke. He appeared more concerned with his comedy career than his criminal case.
“Am I gonna be on the front cover?” he asked a News reporter at one point.
“I’m a shock-value comic,” Ransom continued. “That’s what I do. I’m an entertainer.”
Ransom and his alleged lookout, Jagger Freeman, were indicted on charges of murder, manslaughter, assault and robbery in the death of the 42-year-old Simonsen and the wounding of the detective’s partner Sgt. Matthew Gorman.
Though Ransom wielded a fake gun incapable of firing, prosecutors charged him under a law specifying that a participant in a violent felony is responsible for any deaths resulting from the crime. The suspect insisted that he never imagined the stunt taking such a horrific turn.
“I’m not a monster,” he said. “I didn’t know what was going to happen that night.”
Ransom told The News that Freeman was videotaping the bogus robbery as he used the fake gun to corral the store’s two workers. Dressed all in black, Ransom ordered the employees into the back.
“Dude, this isn’t funny,” one of the employees told him.
Ransom said he returned the workers’ cash, handed them his business card and walked from the store’s back room into the line of fire. Freeman bolted from the scene once the shooting began, cops said.
Contradicting Ransom’s comedic claims are charges against the comedian in four previous cell phone store robberies. Authorities claim Freeman joined Ransom for a Feb. 8 holdup at another T-Mobile outlet.
The duo communicated via cell phone to plot the earlier heist, and texted each other afterwards to discuss splitting the more than $3,000 netted in the robbery, court papers allege.
Ransom’s attorney, Ken Finkelman of Legal Aid, told The News in February that his client suffers mental health issues and was possibly trying to commit suicide by cop.
Ransom said he remembered the glass windows shattering around him as the officers opened fire.
“At the time I thought I was going to die,” he said. “There was a lot of blood.”
Ransom has a history of odd behavior, including a September 2016 visit to the 71st Precinct in Crown Heights where he was dressed in his underwear with a red towel tied around his neck like a cape.
The inmate said he gravitated toward comedy because he was an adopted child and felt the need to stand out from his brothers.
“There’s a price to pay to be famous,” he added.
Though awaiting a trial that could jail him for life, Ransom wants to continue doing comedy — and intends to write a book about his life.
“It’s already in the works,” he said. “It’ll be a New York Times bestseller!”
Employees at the TMobile store where the shootout happened said it was against company policy to talk about it.
“And to be honest …. I don’t want to remember what happened,” one employee added.