Live Updates: Mourners Gather for Funeral of Officer Slain in Manhattan

New York Times

5 days ago

The house of Didarul Islam, a police officer killed in the Midtown shooting, in the Bronx on Monday.
The black-and-blue bunting, a familiar marking of the loss of a police officer, arrived at the 47th Precinct in the Bronx on Tuesday morning. Firefighters used a ladder truck to mount the half-moon mourning flag over the building's front doors.
But already, a sense of quiet gloom had settled over the station house and the surrounding block, the day after Officer Didarul Islam, 36, was gunned down in the lobby of a Midtown skyscraper.
Officers from all over the Bronx, their precinct numbers pinned to their collars — the 52, the 41, the 44 and 46 — filed quietly into the precinct to show support or to work the regular officers' shifts on Tuesday, a custom known as a 'fly-in.'
'You don't want to go back out on the force with this on your mind,' said Officer Seville Legrand, who worked with Officer Islam.
'He was quiet, but if you worked with him, he wouldn't shut up,' Officer Legrand said.
A clergyman who frequently works with the police, Oswald Denis, led officers inside the precinct in prayer. A single lit candle rested outside the entrance.
A twin scene, played out in civilian clothes dampening in the brutal heat, occurred at Officer Islam's home in the Parkchester section of the Bronx. Family and relatives arrived Tuesday morning to mourn with the slain man's family — his parents, two young sons and his wife, carrying their third child, due in weeks.
Officer Islam, 36, an immigrant from Bangladesh, was a three-and-a-half-year veteran of the Police Department.
He was killed in a massacre at a Park Avenue skyscraper Monday as he provided security there. The police say a gunman drove from Las Vegas to open fire in the lobby and beyond, killing four people and himself. Investigators on Tuesday said it appeared the gunman had been targeting the headquarters of the National Football League.
Officer Islam was the first to die.
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Didarul Islam, in a photo released by the New York Police Department.
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NYPD News, via X
'He was saving lives. He was protecting New Yorkers,' Mayor Eric Adams said Monday at a news conference at the Manhattan hospital where Officer Islam was pronounced dead. 'He embodies what this city is all about. He's a true blue New Yorker, not only in a uniform he wore.'
Didarul Islam was a devout Muslim, attending the Parkchester Islamic Center before his cousin started a local mosque near his home. He became deeply involved in that place of worship, the Bronx Islamic Cultural Center Masjid Bilal.
He encouraged congregants searching for work to consider joining the Police Department as traffic agents, a job he said was safer than walking patrols.
'I knew him very well because always on his off days he would come to our masjid,' said Anamul Haque, a friend. 'On his off days he would often come for all five prayers.'
On Monday night, an imam came to console the family. Uber drivers from the community ferried friends and other relatives to the home as a police detail watched over the scene. Children ran and played between their parents' legs, unaware of the tragedy. The steady stream of mourners continued through Tuesday, bearing offerings of food and baked dishes wrapped in aluminum foil.
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An ambulance carrying the body of Officer Islam, in Manhattan early Tuesday.
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Vincent Alban/The New York Times
Shueb Chowdhury, 49, who rented a basement apartment in Officer Islam's home, said the officer had been devoted to his family.
'I cannot believe it,' Mr. Chowdhury said. 'He was very young. I saw him this morning, and 12 hours later he's dead.' Another tenant, Shuborna Akter Protha, 40, has known her landlord for a few years, a busy man who was nonetheless attentive to her apartment's needs.
'He is a good man,' she said. 'He has a good bond with every family member. Even with us. He did everything he could do for us. 'I will fix it when I get time.' He gets time maybe one day or two days.'
Marjanul Karim, 31, a close family friend, said that Officer Islam had mentored young men in the Bangladeshi community, more than 100,000-strong in polyglot New York City. He had expected Mr. Islam to attend his wedding in September.
Mr. Karim said the fallen officer 'came as an immigrant, started working as a security guard at a school.'
'He wanted to support his family and be in a better position, and he fell in love with law enforcement while working security,' Mr. Karim said. 'At the time, my mother told him, 'You left a safe job working for a school in security, and being a cop is dangerous. Why did you do that?' He told her he wanted to leave behind a legacy for his family, something they could be proud of.'
As a patrolman, Officer Islam handled cases involving assaults, domestic violence and burglaries, Officer Legrand said. He picked up overtime when he could. And he worked his side job through the Police Department's Paid Detail Unit, created in 1998 to allow uniformed officers to function as security guards while off duty.
His loss reverberated through his neighborhood Tuesday. Behind the counter of a bodega, Neohalin Medina recalled the officer's visits every day at around 4 p.m. with his two children. He would arrive, sometimes in slippers, and set the children loose in the aisles to hunt for treats.
'He would say, 'Get anything you want,'' Mr. Medina said, but Fritos were Officer Islam's personal favorite.
'He was a good guy,' he said as he flipped an egg on the bodega's grill. 'He just wanted to make sure his family was OK.'
Salman Ahmed, 21, a brother-in-law, thought that Officer Islam walked a safe beat in the 47th Precinct and didn't see much action.
'He always seemed calm about his work, and he loved his job, but we never thought that this might happen,' he said. 'He never shared, and we never knew he would be involved in shootings.'
The pain of the officer's killing was also felt thousands of miles away in Bangladesh. Mizanul Haque, a cousin of Officer Islam, said the officer's close relatives in Sylhet in the nation's east were left speechless by the news, which Mr. Haque had arranged to be shared over the loudspeaker of the local mosque. 'He worked very hard to get to this position,' Mr. Haque said. 'Now everything ended.'
Fazlul Haque, a distant relative, said Officer Islam had visited Sylhet a year ago and had plans to visit again in the coming months. He said Officer Islam would send money to Bangladesh to help relatives and villagers pay for medical treatment and other needs.
In the Bronx, as the evening prayer service ended, more members of the community walked in to pay their respects. His next-door neighbor, MD Shahjada, remembered Officer Islam for the prayer mat he gave him last year after the officer completed the Hajj, the pilgrimage to Mecca every able-bodied Muslim is expected to take. The ritual was a point of pride for Officer Islam — and a rare occasion he was willing to take off work.
'That's who he was,' Mr. Shahjada said.
Mr. Karim said that Officer Islam's ability to flourish in New York — the house, the solid municipal job — had made him a model.
'He said serve the community and you'll do fine,' Mr. Karim said.
'Unfortunately, this is the ugly side of the line that they are in, but he died a hero,' Mr. Karim continued. 'He would always tell my mother, 'We all have to die one way or another,' and so I guess this is the way that he left.'
Across the street from the precinct on Tuesday, a worker paused after a busy night selling water and juice to grim-faced police officers. He recognized Officer Islam from a photograph.
'He was,' the worker said, 'a good cop.'
Santul Nerkar and Maia Coleman contributed reporting from the Bronx. Saif Hasnat contributed reporting from Dhaka, Bangladesh.