Mayor, NYPD Chief Condemn Deadly Police Shooting of Mentally Ill Bronx Woman

 

By Checkey Beckford, Jonathan Dienst and Katherine Creag

The NYPD sergeant who shot and killed an emotionally disturbed 66-year-old woman at her apartment in the Bronx Tuesday after she charged him with a bat has been placed on modified duty as top city officials, including the mayor and the head of the police department, condemn the gunfire.

Police Commissioner James O'Neill said after a breakfast in the city Wednesday that it appeared some NYPD protocol as it relates to emotionally disturbed individuals was not followed in the case of Deborah Danner, who was shot twice after police responded to her apartment building.

"What is clear in this one instance, we failed. I want to know why it happened," O'Neill said. "We do have policies and procedures for handling emotionally disturbed people and it looks like some of those procedures weren't followed."

Mayor de Blasio said there had been past 911 reports regarding Danner, who had schizophrenia. Danner's sister, Jennifer, had been there many of those times to help authorities take Deborah to the hospital. She was there Tuesday, expecting police to help escort her sister out safely as they had in the past.

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Source: NBC News