Feb 8, 2008 8:24 am US/Eastern
NYPD Officer Accidentally Shoots 2-Year-Old
Reporting
Lou Young
NEW YORK (CBS) ―
The father of a 2 year-old Brooklyn boy accidentally shot by his police officer neighbor says he will likely sue the city over happened in his Mill Basin home Thursday afternoon.
Justin Porcellini says he had just moved in to the ground floor apartment at 602 South Mayfair Drive on Saturday with his wife and five children. He says heard a loud noise from upstairs about 3 PM and was trying to comfort his terrified youngest son when the upstairs neighbor, an off-duty police officer, came down to explain what had happened.
He tells CBS 2 that the officer claimed to have been cleaning his handgun when it fell from a table and discharged sending a bullet through the floor and into the Procellini's home.
The shaken father, who owns a grocery store in Sheepshead Bay, says the officer was standing next to him when he lifted his son to quiet him and noticed the blood flowing from the toddler's left forearm; The bullet passed through the fleshy part of the arm and missed the bone. The boy was treated at Brookdale Hospital and brought home by his parents late Thursday night.
The father spoke with CBS 2's Lou Young just before midnight. "I'm angry," he said. "A couple of inches more and it would've hit him in the head." The toddler was rushed to Brookdale Hospital, and treated for his injuries, but crime scene officer from Brooklyn South remained on the scene until well after midnight trying to verify the officer's story. In an odd twist they had to bring their emergency lights to the scene because the officer's upstairs apartment was without electricity. Con Edison had apparently turned the power off on Tuesday because of non-payment.
The electric account at the upstairs apartment is in the name of Patrick Venetek who is listed as an NYPD officer assigned to Manhattan's 1st Precinct. Venetek is also an Army veteran who has served in Iraq. He is 23 years old.
Neighbors tell CBS 2 that Venetek grew up in Mill Basin and lives in the Mayfair Drive apartment with his brother and another man. The Police Department has had no official comment on the incident.
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