Pregnant wife, 2 kids left behind as Bangladeshi officer killed in New York shooting

On a sleepy Bronx street, relatives, friends and leaders of the Muslim community that enveloped Didarul Islam came early Tuesday to pay their respects just hours after he was gunned down.

Islam, 36, was a 3 1/2-year veteran of the New York Police Department, an immigrant from Bangladesh and the father of two. His wife is pregnant with their third child.

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He was killed in a massacre at a Park Avenue skyscraper Monday as he provided security there. Police say a gunman drove from Las Vegas to open fire in the lobby and beyond, killing four people and himself. His motive was unclear. Islam was the first to die.

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"He was saving lives. He was protecting New Yorkers," Mayor Eric Adams said in a news conference at the Manhattan hospital where he 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."

In the Parkchester section of the Bronx, police officers shuffled in and out of the two-story home Islam had purchased for his family and parents. A child wailed inside. The imam of the local mosque came to console the family.

Many of them, Uber drivers, 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 past 1am Tuesday, bearing offerings of food and baked dishes wrapped in aluminum foil.

Shueb Chowdhury, 49, a basement tenant of Islam, said he had been devoted to his family.

“I cannot believe it,” Chowdhury said. “He was very young. I saw him this morning and 12 hours later he’s dead.”

Marjanul Karim, 31, a close family friend, said that Islam had mentored young men in the Bangladeshi community, more than 100,000-strong in polyglot New York City. He had expected Islam to attend his wedding in September.

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,” 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.”

According to relatives, Islam was a pillar in his largely Bangladeshi neighbourhood. An active member of his mosque, he encouraged congregants searching for work to consider joining the Police Department as traffic agents, a job he said was safer than walking patrols. At home, he said little about his duties.

Salman Ahmed, 21, a brother-in-law, thought that 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.”

As the evening prayer service ended, more members of the community walked to pay their respects. His next-door neighbour, MD Shahjada, remembered Islam for the prayer mat he gave him last year after he completed the Hajj, the pilgrimage to Mecca every able-bodied Muslim is expected to take. The ritual was a point of pride for Islam — and a rare occasion he was willing to take off work.

“That’s who he was,” Shahjeda said.

Karim said that Islam’s ability to flourish in New York — the house, the solid municipal job — had made him a model.

“People in lesser positions would often ask him how do you do it?” Karim said. “And he loved the force. He got his foot in the door, and so he encouraged people to do the same.

“He said serve the community and you’ll do fine.”

“Unfortunately, this is the ugly side of the line that they are in, but he died a hero,” 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.”

This article first appeared in New York Times