No bail in cop slay
2nd susp held in Qns. friendly-fire tragedy
The ex-con accused of murder and robbery in the friendly-fire fatal shooting of a veteran detective was ordered held without bail Friday after his lawyers argued in vain the suspect was trying to commit suicide by cop.
Christopher Ransom, charged with felony murder, aggravated manslaughter and robbery in the death of Detective Brian Simonsen, was arraigned by video in Queens Criminal Court.
Ransom, 27, appeared in the video feed propped up in his bed at New York-Presbyterian Hospital Queens, with heavy-lidded eyes and electrodes attached to his shirtless chest. He seemed fully aware of what was happening.
The complaint against Ransom charges him with second-degree murder in Simonsen’s death during a robbery Tuesday of a T-Mobile cell phone store store on Atlantic Ave. in Richmond Hill.
He is accused of killing Simonsen because in carrying out the robbery with a fake gun, he did “recklessly engage in conduct which created a grave risk of death to another person, and thereby did cause the death of another person.”
A second suspect in the robbery was in police custody Friday night at the 102nd Precinct, law enforcement sources said.
Simonsen and seven other cops had responded to the T-Mobile store.
Ransom, armed with a fake gun police said he pointed at officers, was shot eight times in a hail of 42 bullets fired in 11 seconds by Simonsen and fellow cops.
A police bullet struck Simonsen in the chest, killing him. Simonsen’s supervisor, Sgt. Matthew Gorman, was struck in the leg and survived.
One of Ransom’s Legal Aid lawyers, Mihea Kim, asked Judge Bruna DiBiase to “step back from the hype of the media.”
“When my client was taken out of that T-Mobile store, what he had in his hands was a toy gun,” Kim said arguing for bail. Simonsen was “shot and killed, in fact, by friendly fire,” she said.
“(Ransom) was making an apparent effort at police suicide,” said Ken Finkelman, another Legal Aid lawyer on the case.
Assistant District Attorney Robert Ciesla spoke of the “truly horrific outcome” of Ransom’s alleged robbery, and noted that his fake gun didn’t look like a toy.
“In fact, it was an imitation pistol,” he said. “It looks completely like a 9-mm. pistol or a Glock pistol, as well.”
DiBiase ordered Ransom held without bail and placed on suicide watch and in protective custody. Kim said Ransom has received “multiple death threats” on his Facebook page.
Outside court, Paul DiGiacomo, vice president of the Detectives’ Endowment Association, said the charges against Ransom are appropriate.
“We look forward to his conviction and his incarceration,” DiGiacomo said.
A grand jury is to start hearing evidence in the case next week.
The city’s top cop also said Friday that Simonsen’s friendly-fire death could be used as a teaching tool for future generations of police officers.
“I’m going to ask Chief (Theresa) Shortell, the chief of training, to take a look at this incident and see what we can do to prevent this from happening again,” Police Commissioner James O’Neill said on AM 970’s “Joe Piscopo Show.”
“We want to take a look at everything that happened that night and see what we can learn from it.”