When police officers showed up at a Harlem apartment to arrest a suspect for a recent domestic incident, he shot at them before barricading himself, setting off a three-hour standoff that ended with him taking his own life, police said.
Suspect shoots New York cops, kills himself during standoff in Harlem apartment
Friends of Antonio Armstrong, 23, were texting in disbelief after he locked himself in his fifth-floor home on W. 147th St. near Adam Clayton Powell Jr. Boulevard after shooting at police officers, rushing them out of the apartment.
“I hope it’s not you,” she texted Armstrong, her lifelong friend and neighbor, as heavily armed police surrounded the block. She received no response.
NYPD cops were about to arrest Armstrong for a domestic incident around 8:30 a.m. when “he pulled a gun and started shooting at our officers,” said NYPD Chief Rodney Harrison.
Officers were within 8 to 10 feet of Armstrong when he began firing, Harrison said.
On Wednesday, after Armstrong fired at the officers, NYPD Emergency Services Unit officers and the Hostage Negotiation team flooded the scene. Soon after, Armstrong stopped responding to their attempts to communicate, officers said.
Cops found Armstrong on the floor of his apartment dead from a “self-inflicted gunshot wound to the head,” Harrison said.
An unharmed woman was found in the apartment with Armstrong, though her role in the standoff was not immediately clear. “We don’t know if she was in danger or not,” Harrison said.
A blood-stained handgun was also recovered from the apartment.
The woman in the apartment cried as she left the building when the standoff ended.
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