New York Police Shooting: Gunman Told Public “Watch What I’m Going To Do”

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Police have reportedly said that the gunman who shot dead two New York police officers told members of the public “watch what I’m going to do” shortly before the attack.

Ismaaiyl Brinsley, 28, had posted messages on social media saying he would kill police officers in retaliation for the death of Eric Garner, a black man who died when white police officers arrested him.

The gunman’s posts on Instagram indicated he had been motivated by the deaths of 18-year-old Michael Brown and Eric Garner at the hands of police officers.

Brinsley, 28, had been arrested at least 19 times and had a troubled childhood so violent that his mother was afraid of him, police said.

He also was said to have a history of violence and mental instability.

Candlelit vigils have been held in New York in memory of the two officers, Liu Wenjin and Raphael Ramos.

New York police officers turned their backs on de Blasio the New York Mayor in protest during a news conference and their union said that the Mayor had blood on his hands after Saturday’s shooting.

On Saturday afternoon, Brinsley fired four rounds at officers Rafael Ramos and Wenjian Liu in the Bedford-Stuyvesant neighborhood. The officers, who were hit in head, were assigned from their normal downtown Brooklyn beat to an area of the borough with a high crime rate, authorities said.

The head of the New York Police, Robert Boyce, said that the men had been “targeted for their uniform”. The gunman then ran into a subway station where he shot himself.

Brinsley shot them as they sat in their patrol car in Brooklyn before running into a nearby subway station and reportedly shooting himself.

Before he arrived in Brooklyn by bus, Brinsley had shot and seriously wounded an ex-girlfriend in Baltimore on Saturday morning, Boyce said.

Shaneka Nicole Thompson, 29, was shot in the abdomen, Baltimore authorities said Sunday.

She is in critical but stable condition at a hospital, authorities told CNN. Investigators were able to talk to her, Boyce said.

She said that when Brinsley showed up at her apartment, they argued. Her mother called during that and heard the bickering but the phone hung up, according to Boyce. The first call to 911 came at 5:50 a.m. from a neighbor who heard shots fired.

The Rev Al Sharpton, a prominent civil rights activist, said Mr Garner’s family had no connection to the gunman and called the killings “reprehensible”.

Across the country, police departments were on edge on Sunday following the attack in New York and another in Florida. A police officer on duty outside Tampa was shot to death early Sunday and a suspect has been arrested, local authorities reported. There was no indication yet of a motive.

The St. Louis Police Officers Association on Sunday asked the department to step up security, while Baltimore’s police union said that the current political environment was the most dangerous for officers since the 1960s.