3 quizzed over shooting of NY police officers

Three suspects were being questioned yesterday about the shootings of two New York City police officers responding to a grocery store robbery.

One of the suspects was seen on a surveillance video from the crime scene in the Bronx, police said. No charges have been filed.

Both officers are listed in stable condition after the shootings on Monday night.

The plain-clothes officers were coming off their shift when they responded to the robbery report along with three colleagues.

“They went above and beyond the call to protect their fellow New Yorkers. Thank God the officers are doing well and will recover,” Mayor Bill de Blasio said at the hospital where the officers are recovering.

The shooting came about two weeks after two officers were fatally shot while sitting in their patrol car in Brooklyn, and on the same day that the city touted record low crime levels.

The deaths of the two officers raised tensions between police and the mayor.

Police unions said the mayor has stoked anti-police sentiment by supporting protests against the police killings of unarmed black men in New York and Missouri.

Monday night’s shooting unfolded as police were searching for suspects for an armed robbery that occurred earlier at a grocery store.

Police Commissioner William Bratton said the officers, part of an anti-crime unit, were in a car when they spotted two possible suspects in the robbery — one outside a Chinese restaurant and another inside it.

He said when the officers got out, the suspect in the restaurant opened fire, forcing the officers to shoot back. The two suspects fled and then carjacked a white Camaro, which was later found abandoned. A revolver was recovered nearby.

The organisation COP SHOT, Citizens Outraged at Police Being Shot, had offered a $10,000 reward leading to the arrest and conviction of the suspects.

The two officers were not identified. They were described as a 30-year-old who was shot in his left arm and lower back, and a 38-year-old hit in his left arm and chest.

On December 20, Officers Rafael Ramos and Wenjian Liu were gunned down in their patrol car by a man who vowed online to kill “pigs.”

The man opened fire, then ran into a subway where he shot himself to death.