Friday’s police shooting of an alleged armed-robbery suspect in Queens “underscores the dangers police officers face every day,” Commissioner Ray Kelly said yesterday.
The NYPD said the third police shooting in three days appeared to be justified, as the suspect, identified as 24-year-old Wayne Bolton, appeared to reach for a revolver in his waistband.
Cops recovered a .38-caliber pistol with four rounds in the cylinder.
The wounding of Bolton followed a pair of incidents in Brooklyn last week that involved police gunfire.
Despite the spike this week and a the high-profile shooting of Sean Bell in Queens, Kelly said incidents of police shootings are actually down from 34 this time last year to 31 and were “down significantly from 10 years ago.” In the latest incident, Bolton allegedly fled from cops as plainclothes officers from the anti-crime unit tried to question him about a robbery.