Police Officer Larry DePrimo makes me proud to be a New Yorker. And a human being.
At 25, his small, bashful voice still cracks. But after 2 1/2 years on the job, he was pounding a beat amid the winos and thugs and pioneering yuppies on West 44th Street. And Officer DePrimo committed a small act of random kindness that proved so powerful, so grand and beautiful, it turned this shy near-rookie into a rock star.
He just doesn’t know it.
On a freezing November night, DePrimo spotted an elderly man with no socks and no shoes on his feet. People who even noticed the man laughed in his direction.
And the officer did something that so many of us who don’t even see the homeless as human would not dare. He saw the man not as someone to avoid, to run away from.
He asked the man’s shoe size — 12. And he walked into Skechers in Times Square, dipped into his own pocket for $50, and bought the homeless stranger a present he’d never before possessed. A new pair of boots. It was as natural as breathing.
“I could see the blisters from the distance,” the cop said shyly. “It was just so cold. I just had to do something.”
But the man, who’d grown accustomed to moving on, walked away, right in his bare feet, and the officer chased him down on Seventh Avenue.
“I knelt down and put the socks on him, the shoes on him,” DePrimo, still stunned by the attention to an act he doesn’t see as particularly special, said while meeting the press at Police Headquarters.
“It’s OK,” he quoted the man, whose name he does not know, as saying. “I never had a pair of shoes.
“But God bless you.”
Look at yourself and ask: Who among us would do the same?
We walk by the homeless daily as if they’re invisible, a nuisance or a communicable disease.
But some, like this nameless gentleman, are merely humble citizens who’ve fallen on hard times. Or perhaps hardship, drugs or despair is all they’ve ever known.
And yet, I have to admit I’m among the hordes who look the other way at the suffering. Officer DePrimo did not.
At a young age, he had the wisdom to understand that we are all individuals. All God’s children, deserving of respect and love.
He offered the man hot coffee. A meal. A warm place to sit, if only for a few minutes.
“He said, ‘No, officer, you’ve done enough. God bless you. Be safe. I love the police.’ ”
DePrimo didn’t realize it at the time, but an Arizona tourist took a picture of him, and it was posted on the police Web site. And now he is famous.
Still, the young cop who lives with his parents on Long Island doesn’t see himself as a hero. “This thing happens every day.”
He’s right.
The vast majority of cops I know are the kindest, gentlest folks I’ve met. DePrimo’s act of kindness was not an aberration. He did what he had to do.
So this holiday season, and all the days ahead, thank a cop for doing his job. I guarantee he or she will appreciate it.
In this city, the police have your back.