The father of one of the two NYPD officers shot while responding to an armed robbery in the Bronx on Monday said his son was upset when he learned that New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio visited the hospital while he was in surgery.
“He deals with some crappy people every day and getting no support — come on,” Joe Dossi
told the New York Post. “These are the guys in the trenches dealing with anything and everything.”
Dossi’s son, Andrew Dossi, and Officer Aliro Pellerano, were shot Monday night while responding to a robbery at a deli. Both are expected to survive.
De Blasio and the NYPD have been at odds since the mayor seemed to support anti-police protesters over his own officers following a grand jury’s decision not to indict a white police officer in the chokehold death of a black man resisting arrest in Staten Island. The death of Eric Garner followed the killing of Ferguson, Missouri teen Michael Brown, who was fatally wounded by a white police officer after charging him in August. A Missouri grand jury also did not indict that officer.
De Blasio said he has warned his mixed-race son to be extra careful when dealing with police.
Joe Dossi said that when de Blasio and New York Police Commissioner Bill Bratton showed up at the hospital, he tried to let the mayor know that the NYPD deserves more respect.
“I told him these guys are laying their lives on the line,” Joe Dossi told the Post, adding that “the mayor seemed passive, like he was just listening to what Bratton was saying and what I was saying.”
Dossi
told the New York Daily News that while his son was “irate” over the mayor’s comment, he thought it was OK for de Blasio to visit and that he seemed “concerned.”
Pellerano, according to the Daily News, also did not see the mayor when he visited, telling fellow officers to tell de Blasio he just wanted to be with his family.