Two brothers who were involved in a shooting that left an off-duty NYPD officer hurt have been charged in the road rage altercation, according to police.
Brothers Edwin and Shawn Rivera were charged with assault, weapon possession and obstructing governmental administration, police said Thursday. Shawn Rivera, who was not behind the wheel of either vehicle, also faces charges of strangulation, criminal mischief and resisting arrest.
Attorney information for the brothers was not immediately available.
Police said the altercation happened just before 1 p.m. when the officer got into a shouting match with a driver of a minivan, identified by police 32-year-old Edwin Rivera, who was apparently blocking the roadway. The spat escalated, police said, when both men pulled over near Queens Boulevard and 70th Street in Maspeth.
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Police say that’s when another man in the van – 27-year-old Shawn Rivera, Edwin's brother – ran up to the off-duty officer’s car and smashed the back window. At that point, the off-duty officer pulled out his service weapon and identified himself as an officer, NYPD officials said.
"Our off-duty member is trying to call 911, as he’s holding the two males at gunpoint, he’s identifying himself as a police officer. At one point he puts his phone down, he’s grabs the male who broke the car window, he's announcing his authority as a police officer that the male is under arrest," Jeffrey Maddrey, chief of department, said at a press conference.
When the officer re-holstered his weapon, that's when officials said the brothers put him in a chokehold and struggled over the gun. Two shots were fired.
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The officer was struck in the leg and one of the brothers was shot in the hand, according to police. It’s unclear who fired the shots or if the gun went off accidentally during the fight.
Cell phone video taken by a witness apparently captured the off-duty officer and the two men wrestling over a gun when the firearm suddenly went off.
Both Rivera brothers were taken into police custody, as Edwin Rivera was taken away in an ambulance with a gunshot wound to his hand, police sources told NBC New York. He is expected to recover.
The unidentified officer, who has been with the NYPD for five years, was taken to Elmhurst Hospital, where he was expected to recover, police said. Maddrey said he had visited with the officer and said he's "in good spirits."
Police said the two brothers have six prior arrests.
An investigation is ongoing.
