On Tuesday evening (March 10) in Brooklyn, a 69-year-old former corrections officer fatally shot a man after getting into an altercation with him in a subway station. The dispute started on a 4 train and spilled out onto the platform of the Borough Hall train station.
Reports the New York Daily News:
The man who was slain, Gilbert Drogheo, 32, and another man began harassing the 69-year-old retired officer as he boarded a Brooklyn-bound 4 train at the Bowling Green station in Manhattan around 6:30 p.m., according to police sources and a witness.
“They were talking mad trash,” said the witness, 30-year-old Thomas Berry of Crown Heights, who was on his way home from work when he saw the argument. “They must have been drunk.”
The witness said that either Drogheo or his friend told the older man: “Oh, I got you now, my n—–,” as the retired officer tried to walk between the pair to get on the train.
The harassment continued on the train ride. That’s when things got ugly.
“(The older man) said, ‘I’m not your n—–, I’m not your boy,’” the witness said. “He said, ‘Leave me alone, don’t talk to me.’ He was being really calm.”
But the dispute heated up as the train left the station and traveled through the tunnel under the East River, then turned violent when one member of the duo punched the retired correction officer in the head as he tried to get off at Borough Hall, Berry and police said.
A witness said the retired CO pulled out a gun, but was pushed down against a seat by one of his attackers. People on the train ran off when they realized he had a gun.
The retired CO followed his attackers off the train and at some point he put a clip in the gun.
In footage of the shooting taken by cell phone you can hear someone yell, “Don’t shoot OG. Don’t shoot him.”
The witness said the gunman followed Drogheo up the stairs to the mezzanine level. It was not clear if he had his gun drawn as he went upstairs. A video obtained by Channel 2 shows the retired correction officer punching Drogheo. Then the scuffle resumed, and the retiree shot the younger man once in the torso during the struggle, according to police and MTA sources.
Drogheo was taken to the hospital but died of his injuries.
No charges have been filed, yet.
This story is developing, but the message is very clear—careful who you mess with.
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Photo: CBS News
