Manhattan prosecutors on Wednesday played dramatic footage of a brave officer on foot chasing a career criminal who’d just fatally shot a cop in East Harlem last year.
Police Officer Kristen Swinkunas and her partner were driving south on Harlem River Drive with lights flashing and sirens blaring when they spotted Tyrone Howard, 31, standing on the freeway’s divider, she said at a Manhattan Supreme Court hearing.
“My partner said to me. ‘Right there, there!’ I automatically threw the car in park and jumped out,” she said of the Oct. 20 foot chase. “As soon as he saw our vehicle stop, he took off running.”
She shouted, “Get on the f—king ground!” as she sprinted after him at least 25 feet as he fled north into a steady stream of southbound traffic.
After repeated orders, Howard, who was shot in the buttocks and leg, finally complied, she said.
Swinkunas and her partner dragged him from the traffic back onto the concrete medium near 125th Street.
As soon as she told her captain of the collar, he radioed: “Central, we got him!”
Minutes earlier Howard allegedly murdered NYPD officer Randolph Holder, 33, during a foot chase following a drug-related shootout in East Harlem.
As Holder and his partner chased the thug down a ramp near the footbridge of the East River Promenade and 120th Street, Howard allegedly pulled out a .40-caliber Glock and shot Holder in the forehead.
Howard, whose rap sheet includes 28 arrests, was not present for the procedural hearing, which will determine whether statements he made to authorities and witness identifications are admissible at trial.
On Tuesday, Howard whined that he was unprepared for the proceeding and refused to remain in the courtroom.
As court officers led him back to a holding cell, Holder’s stepmother shouted, “You piece of sh-! Why did you kill my son?”
