NYC NOW - Evening Roundup: Midtown Shooting Victim Was NYPD Officer on Paid Detail, Cell Phone Restrictions in Schools, Older Residents Struggle in NYC and Polling New Jersey’s Governor's Race

Episode Date: July 29, 2025

The NYPD officer who was the first person killed in a shooting in a Midtown office building Monday evening was working a special assignment that many officers take to earn extra money. Plus, New York Gov. Kathy Hochul is planning to implement phone restrictions in schools this fall. Also, New York’s oldest residents are finding it hard to pay their bills, buy healthy food or leave their home. And finally, a new poll on the New Jersey governor's race puts Democratic Rep. Mikie Sherrill's lead against Republican Jack Ciattarelli in the single digits.

One of the Midtown shooting victims was an NYPD officer on paid detail. Cell phone restrictions and schools. Older residents struggle in New York City and polling New Jersey's governor's race. From WMYC, this is NYC now. I'm Jene Pierre. We're learning more about the victims of the mass shooting in Midtown Manhattan Monday that killed four people. One of them was building security guard Alain Etienne. Investment firm Blackstone also says one of it,

Its executives, Wesley Lepatner, was also killed in the shooting. Late Monday, Commissioner Jessica Tisch identified Diderot Islam as the police officer who died in the attack. He put himself in harm's way. He made the ultimate sacrifice, shot in cold blood, wearing a uniform that stood for the promise that he made to this city. Islam was on a paid detail, wearing his NYPD uniform but getting paid by a private company as a contractor. WNYC's Ben FewerHard has been looking into this practice. He found that these side gigs have traditionally been thought of as plum assignments, but as threats to corporate America increase, that could be changing. All right, so Ben, what does it mean when an officer works a paid detail?

So it's a program the NYPD launched in the 1990s to increase uniform police presence at certain locations. So something like a Yankee game, for example, will have officers working these details. They're technically off duty, but they're working in uniform as a security yard. And other locations that have these details include things like houses of worship in the city and Midtown office buildings. And the officers who work these details get paid by the private company that hires them, not the NYPD for the time they put in. What do officers say about these assignments? So we actually, we looked back at depositions from a civil suit that were taken in 2022 and 2023, and these depositions included interviews with a number of officers who were assigned

to Bloomberg's headquarters on Lexington Avenue, which is just blocks away from where the shooting happened on Monday. And the officers in these depositions described pretty mundane security tasks that you might expect at a midtown office building, things like shoeing away skateboarders, getting hot dog vendors off the block, and making sure homeless people don't come into the building. Ben, I'm wondering what if the people you spoke to said about an officer being killed on a paid detail assignment? Is that something that happens often? So I actually spoke to a former FBI agent who helped lead the Joint Terrorism Task Force in New York.

And he made the point that this shooting kind of showed how vulnerable office buildings are to an attacker armed with a rifle. He also made the point that this comes after the United Healthcare CEO was assassinated in Midtown. And he said further attacks similar to what happened on Monday could certainly be. spring up similar to the way the country experienced several series of school shootings after Columbine. So this is a situation where it demonstrates that it's possible and it's likely going to initiate copycat attack. So you're saying a shooting like this could inspire something like this to happen in the future. Yeah. So he also made the point that the sort of political climate in the country right now.

now could certainly add to that. As I mentioned earlier, Dideru Islam was the first person to be killed during Monday evenings shooting in Midtown. What can you tell us about him? Police commissioner Jessica Tish spoke briefly about him at the hospital. She said he was a

immigrant from Bangladesh. He served for three and a half years. And the department worked at a precinct in the Bronx, the 4-7 precinct. And he's a father of two children and his wife is currently pregnant with her third child. Wow. That's WNYC's Benfewer heard. For more of our coverage on the Midtown shooting, visit our news site,

Got the Mist. Stick around. More local news headlines after the break. New York Governor Kathy Hokel is planning to implement bell-to-bell cell phone restrictions in schools this fall. The distraction-free school law will prohibit the use of smartphones and other internet-enabled personal devices during the school day. More than half of the school districts throughout the state are complying with the plan. Districts who have not have until Friday to do so. Governor Hogle says school-aged children are suffering. And our young people, especially the teenage, especially teenage girls, are under so much stress right now. And the numbers are chilling.

The number of young people are reporting depression, anxiety, suicidal thoughts. New York City public schools say they're updating their cell phone policy to align with the new state law for the upcoming school year. According to a new survey, New York's oldest residents are finding it hard. to pay their bills, buy healthy food, or leave their home. WMYC's Caring-Y has the details. The city surveyed more than 8,000 New Yorkers who were 60 years older and found many are struggling to pay their rent, credit cards, and food expenses. Nearly a third of those surveyed say they couldn't afford healthy food because it was too

expensive. The report also surveyed caregivers and found a third weren't just caring for an older adult, but a child too. Lorraine Cortez-Vasquez is the commissioner for the Department for the Aging. That means somebody's income is being compromised because they're in a caregiving role. Poverty rates among seniors are rising,

and city officials say it's only going to get worse after President Trump signed his new tax cut in spending law slashing funding for Medicaid and SNAP. Before we go, we're looking into a new poll on the New Jersey governor's race that puts Democrat Mikey Sherrill's lead against Republican Jack Shudorelli in the single digits.

The poll from Farrella Dickinson University has Democratic Congresswoman Cheryl up by eight points against the former State Assembly member and three-time gubernatorial candidate. Pollsters say this is what they would expect to see at this stage in a race, especially in the state that leans Democrat. But they say Shoulderrelli's focus on local issues like housing and energy costs poll well with independence and could provide a path to an upset, should have really lost to current Governor Phil Murphy by just four points in 2021.

Thanks for listening to NYC now from WMYC. I'm Jene Pierre. We'll be back tomorrow.