A smug Brooklyn street thug took his sweet time accepting a plea deal Friday for shooting and permanently injuring a Brooklyn police officer — and even objected that the cop “can still walk.”
Rookie cop James Li, 26, can walk — but needs a cane to get around since he was shot in the leg and crotch by fare-beater Rashaun Robinson, 29, whom he yanked off a city bus in Flatbush on Feb. 26.
“I don’t care if you take the plea or don’t take the plea. I want to make sure you understand the choices you have,” Brooklyn Supreme Court Judge Alan Marrus told Robinson.
He sat silent for almost a minute before muttering, “Still thinking.”
Robinson then whispered with his defense attorney before finally accepting the deal prosecutors said was a “one-time offer.”
When Marrus asked Robinson whether he understood that he caused serious injury to Li — who now must use a metal cane — the heartless thug said quietly, “He can still walk.”
Robinson also answered “45” and “two” when the judge asked him what kind of gun he used and how many shots he fired.
About 15 cops were in court to stare down Robinson and support Li, who graduated from the NYPD police academy just two months before he was shot.
Li said he thought the plea deal was fair but admitted he still has pain from the senseless shooting.
“I think 25 years was a good deal, it was fair,” Li said outside court.
Li said he is undergoing physical therapy.
“I have nerve damage. They say it’s not healing too well right now,” he said.
Robinson pleaded guilty to aggravated assault on a police officer in order to avoid the possibility of being convicted at trial of attempted murder of a police officer, which could have sent him to prison for life.
“This is a good, fair deal that takes this potential cop-killer off the street for 25 years,” said police union president Pat Lynch.
After he was arrested, Robinson told detectives he carries a gun because cops think they run everything.
“They are the biggest gang in New York and are always messing with black people and he is sick of it,” Robinson told them, according to court papers.
He also told police he wanted to kill a cop that day, sources have said.
Robinson said he tried to board the bus without paying and that he had carried the gun he shot Li with “for years,” the papers state.
He will be sentenced Sept. 3.