Officer Sumit Sulan is being applauded for shooting a felon who gunned down one of his colleagues and seriously injured another. But his family says Sumit can’t get what happened out of his head.
Sumit Sulan, 27, an NYPD “super rookie” of Indian origin, shot the man accused of killing another officer and leaving his partner clinging to life, but he’s so shaken he cannot get what happened out of his head, his mum told The Post on Sunday.
“His brain is stuck on the situation,” Dalvir Sulan, 60, said of her hero-cop son.
“I’m proud. Everyone says he did good,” she said of Sumit, who had emigrated from India nearly 15 years ago.
According to police, Lashawn J. McNeil, 47, had walked into a bedroom of his first-floor apartment in Harlem and opened fire at officers Jason Rivera and Wilbert Mora who were there as respondents to a 911 call for a domestic dispute. Officer Sumit Sulan, a complete newcomer to the job, was in the living room talking to the perpetrator’s mother,. Sulan shot McNeil as he tried to flee, striking him in the head and arm, police said.
Officer Jason Rivera, 22, was killed and Officer Wilbert Mora, 27, was gravely injured.
McNeil’s mother, Shirley Sourzes, told the New York Post she had been trying to convince her son to get help for mental health issues, when things began to escalate. She said that she would never have called 911 had she known he was going to use violence against the officers.
“If I knew, I never would have made the phone call,” Shirley Sourzes said in an article published Monday on the Post’s website. “I would never have called!”
McNeil died on Monday of injuries sustained when Sulan shot him. Sumit has been on the job since April and at Harlem’s 32nd Precinct for only two months. He used to work for the Taxi and Limousine Commission as an inspector before joining the academy to become a cop.
“He was passionate about it. He wanted to do this. He wanted to be a cop, so we were happy for him,” Harsha Sulan, Sumit’s elder sister said, speaking to CBS2 News.
However, Sumit is now having trouble overcoming the trauma associated with Friday’s gun violence.
“It’s a lot to take. It’s a lot to take and it’s overwhelming for him as well”, said Harsha. “Everyone in the family is here for him. Everyone in the department is here for him,” she added.
She also said that her family is heartbroken for the other cops, and especially the family of slain Officer Jason Rivera.
“We really feel hurt for the family,” Harsha Sulan said.
Meanwhile, New York City Mayor, Eric Adams made a desperate plea while speaking to members of the media at Harlem Hospital following the sad demise of officer Jason Rivera. He came down hard on those who bring illegal guns into the city, calling them “co-conspirators” in the bloodshed on the streets of New York.
“There are no gun manufacturers in New York City. We don’t make guns here,” Adams said. “How are we removing thousands of guns off the street, and they still find a way into New York City? “We need Washington to join us and act now to stop the flow of guns in New York City and cities like New York,” he urged.
