NY AG Probes Killing Of Suffolk Suspect Who Stabbed 2 Officers: Report

MEDFORD, NY — New York State Attorney General Letitia James' office is investigating the death of a Medford man who was shot dead in a confrontation with Suffolk police last week, Newsday reported.

James' Office of Special Investigation is powered by state law to examine the circumstances surrounding a person's death when law-enforcement is involved. In the examination, investigators will review if the officers could have caused the death by act or omission. James' office began a preliminary assessment to determine if an investigation was warranted, the outlet reported.

Patch has reached out to James' office for comment.

Suffolk police would not comment on the probe.

Enrique Lopez, 56, was shot dead last Wednesday in a struggle with two officers whom he stabbed with a "Rambo-style" knife, Police Commissioner Rodney Harrison told reporters last Thursday.

The medical condition of the 26-year-old officer, who was most seriously injured and placed on a ventilator after the stabbing, was upgraded from fair to good on Tuesday.

Another officer who responded was also treated for tinnitus and later released, while the officer whose stab wounds were not as serious was released last week.

Lopez, who spent two years in jail for a 2011 arrest for assaulting an officer, stabbed the two officers in a struggle around 5 p.m. at an apartment on Birchwood Road in Medford. He was shot and died at the scene, police said.

The 911 call about the fight was placed by a caseworker who was checking on two apartment residents, and one had been violent toward the other, Harrison said, noting that Lopez was irrational and threatening "residential patients" with a fire extinguisher.

Lopez lived in a home where people with disabilities or mental illness, according to police.

The officers had to walk up a flight of stairs to approach Lopez inside a room and when they asked how he was feeling, he pulled out the large knife and lunged at them as they "repeatedly" asked him to drop it, Harrison said.

One of the officers was stabbed in the clavicle, neck, and groin, while the other was stabbed in the chest and the knife struck a rib, according to Harrison.

Chief of the Division of Trauma, Emergency Surgery, and Surgical Critical Care Dr. James Vosswinkel said the officer with life-threatening injuries was stabbed in the neck with about an inch and a half wound that was four inches into his upper chest.

The knife lacerated a large blood vessel going into the officer's heart, Vosswinkel said.

In the struggle, one of the officers fired four rounds, striking the man in his upper torso, Harrison said.

RELATED STORIES:

• LI Prof Faces Backlash After Posts Question Police Confrontation: NYP
• 'By Grace Of God' Stabbed Suffolk Officers Will Go Home: Commissioner