Union hea ad gets testy with h O’Neill
Claims exam proves shooting justified
The NYPD’s sergeants union is amping up its p.r. war against new Police Commissioner James O’Neill — taking out a full-page ad in the New York Post and other publications Monday to condemn O’Neill’s criticisms of the cop who fatally shot a 66year-old, bat-swinging, mentally ill woman.
Sergeants Benevolent Association president Ed Mullins will continue to insist in the ad that the cop was only following his training when he opened fire in a Bronx apartment.
“There is no question that Police Commissioner James O’Neill misspoke when he publicly stated that Sgt. Hugh Barry ‘failed’ dur- ing his fatal encounter with an emotionally disturbed woman who attacked him with a baseball bat in the 43 Precinct on October 18,” Mullins wrote in a letter sent to his members Saturday.
Barry shot Deborah Danner, 66, on Tuesday as she ran at him with a baseball bat, prompting O’Neill to say last week that the department had “failed” the troubled woman.
But for the second time since those remarks, Mullins is pointing to evidence that police are trained to use deadly force when confronted by bat-wielding assailants.
Monday’s ad will feature “Question No. 6” from the Police Academy’s deadly physical force test, which Mullins says proves cops are taught to shoot in situations similar to the one in which Barry found himself.
“With a baseball bat in his hands, an emotionally disturbed man charges at a police officer and threatens to break his nose,” the academy asks in a test question.
“The officer is backed against a wall,” the question continues. “Based on the department’s guidelines on the use of force and deadly physical force . . .”
The test-taker is then presented with four possible answers.
The correct one is: “Because the suspect is threatening immi
nent deadly physical force, the officer may shoot.”
But it’s not clear if Barry had his back against a wall as Danner charged him or whether — given the woman’s age — her attack could fairly be judged as potentially deadly.
Mullins last week pointed to a police firing-range target in which a male figure brandishes a bat — also proof, he said, that cops are taught to fight bats with guns.
“Chief of Patrol Terence Monahan and Commissioner O’Neill had no right whatsoever to place Sgt. Barry on modified assignment before anything resembling an investigation took place,” Mullins rails to his membership in Saturday’s e-mail.
“What they conveniently ignored was the department’s own antiquated training and the fact that police work is not an exact science and circumstances often change in the blink of an eye or the swing of a bat.”
The e-mail ends with the allcaps promise, “TO BE CONTINUED!”