For the fourth time in less than a year, an NYPD officer has been killed. Late Tuesday night in East Harlem, Officer Randolph Holder lost his life at the hands of a gun-wielding thief:
Officer Randolph Holder, 33, was shot in the forehead by the callous gunman, who had stolen a bike and was being pursued by cops along the promenade hugging the East River around 8:30 p.m.,Police Commissioner Bill Brattonsaid. The brave officer died at 10:22 p.m. at Harlem Hospital.
Holder was an emigrant from Guyana who joined the police force in 2010.
In May, NYPD Officer Brian Moore was shot in the face and killed by an ex-convict carrying an illegal firearm.
Last December, two more NYPD officers, Rafael Ramos and Wenjian Liu were taken from their families just days before Christmas when a gunman opened fire as they were sitting in their patrol car. That execution was described on the murderer’s Instagram page as ‘revenge’ for the grand jury decisions that exonerated cops from wrongdoing in the deaths of Michael Brown and Eric Garner, two African-American males.
Racial tension has been the source of cop killings across the country. The blame has often been pointed to a group called “Black Lives Matter,” which has done much damage to promote an anti-cop mentality and promote violence against men and women in uniform.
Holder’s murder did not appear to be pre-planned or influenced by race. NYPD Commissioner Bill Bratton mourned the fallen officer and spoke somberly about the blue lives lost this year.
“I think all of us will tell you this is the hardest thing that we do,” Bratton said. “That we mourn one of our own. I’ve been doing this for 45 years. It doesn’t get easier. It never gets easier and it should never get easier.”
The #BlueLivesMatter hashtag trended on social media to acknowledge Holder’s death.
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