Police probe apparent suicide of NYPD sergeant

April 13, 2015 Brooklyn Daily Eagle

The 84th precinct mourned the loss of slain detectives in December, shown here, and will now have to cope with the death of one of their own officers. Eagle file photo by Rob Abruzzese

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The NYPD is investigating the tragic death of one of its own.

An off-duty police sergeant shot himself in the head in an apparent suicide in his Bay Ridge home on Sunday afternoon, according to various media reports.

The sergeant, identified by several media outlets as James Fitzpatrick, 48, was discovered in the master bedroom of his Narrows Avenue home in Bay Ridge with a gunshot wound to his head shortly before 4 p.m. on Sunday.

The New York Daily News reported that Fitzpatrick was rushed to NYU Lutheran, where he was pronounced dead.

The News also reported that Fitzpatrick, a 24-year veteran of the NYPD, had been out sick for several days before he apparently took his own life. The sergeant reportedly used his service revolver to shoot himself.

“I was inside the house and I heard the screaming and I came out and I saw all the police,” a neighbor, Mark Pedziwiater, told the Daily News. Pedziwiater called the tragic incident “a shock to everybody.”

The New York Post reported that Fitzpatrick’s wife and two children were home at the time of the shooting.

Fitzpatrick was assigned to the 84th Precinct in Brooklyn.