Off-Duty Cop Fatally Shoots Armed Gas Station Robber, Police Say

CANARSIE, BROOKLYN — An off-duty police officer killed a teenager who was trying to rob a gas station at gunpoint Monday night, police officials said.

The cop was sitting in his car outside the gas station at 914 Remsen Ave. when William Simon, 19, and another armed man approached at about 10:35 p.m., said police.

One robber broke into the gas station booth and demanded cash as the second pointed his gun at the cop and the attendant, who had been filling the officer's tank with gas, and told neither of them to move, police said.

The pair tried to flee with the cash, but the off-duty cop told the two armed robbers he was a police officer and ordered them to stop, said police.

Both men turned back toward the officer with their guns raised, the cop shot Simon in the torso and his partner ran away, police said.

Emergency responders rushed Simon, of Lindenwood in Brooklyn, to Brookdale Hospital but doctors were unable to save his life, said police.

Investigators found a .44 caliber revolver at the station but have yet to find the second suspect, whom they describe as a 6-foot-tall man last seen wearing a grey hoodie and jeans.

Photo courtesy of NYPD