This Boy in Blue will live to serve another day.
A Brooklyn police detective shot in the line of duty on July 6 left Kings County Hospital that afternoon surrounded by members of New York’s Finest, who cheered his recovery and thanked him for his service.
Patrol Borough Brooklyn North Det. Miguel Soto’s willingness to take a bullet is a reminder of the selflessness he and fellow officers show every day, according to the city’s top cop, who said many in his ranks, including an on-duty detective shot and killed in the Bronx last year, make the ultimate sacrifice to protect New Yorkers.
“This morning’s incident highlights the extremely dangerous work the men and women of the NYPD perform on a daily basis in every neighborhood,” said Commissioner James O’Neill. “We should all be grateful for the outcome today, particularly as we come off yesterday’s one-year anniversary of the murder of Det. Miosotis Familia in the Bronx.”
Soto, whose command oversees 10 North Brooklyn precincts, and his partner were riding in an unmarked police car on Fulton Street between Kingston and Tompkins avenues around 6:40 am when they spotted a 33-year-old man they recognized as a suspect wanted for a domestic-violence-related armed robbery, O’Neill said.
The pair of officers pulled a U-turn, and the suspect took off on foot towards Tompkins Avenue, hanging a right on Decatur Street, according to the top cop.
The police duo then hopped out of the car and chased the man, telling him they are officers and asking him to show his hands, but the suspect fired at Soto, hitting him in his right leg, O’Neill said.
Soto, a seven-year veteran of the Police Department, fired back, and the man fled, but other officers caught up with him inside a Kingston Avenue apartment building near Herkimer Street.
Paramedics transported the suspect to a nearby hospital, where doctors treated him for a gunshot wound before cops cuffed him, according to O’Neill, who said authorities recovered the firearm he blasted at Soto in a garbage can near the apartment complex.
