WOMAN WHO SHOT NYPD COP IN HEAD WITH PELLET GUN ARRESTED

Tiara Ferebee is held on a $1M bond for shooting a plainclothes NYPD officer in the forehead last week

By Lisa Irizarry and Matthew Chayes

Newsday
October 17, 2016

NEW YORK — A Riverhead woman charged in the pellet-gun shooting of a plainclothes NYPD officer was ordered jailed on $1 million bond or $500,000 cash bail at her arraignment Sunday night in Queens Criminal Court.

Tiara Ferebee, 24, of Andrea Court, faces charges of first degree attempted assault and criminal possession of a weapon, according to a court complaint.

She appeared in court Sunday night in front of Judge Gia Morris. Before Morris set bail, Ferebee’s attorney told the judge no evidence exists connecting his client to the crime other than her alleged proximity, and no weapon was recovered.

The NYPD press office earlier Sunday said Ferebee was accused of attempted murder of a police officer but that charge was not listed in court records.

Just after 5 p.m. Wednesday, a projectile from a pellet gun fired by a passenger in a brown 2015 Nissan Altima struck the officer, Adam Jangel, in the forehead as he drove an unmarked police vehicle west on Jamaica Avenue and 168th Street, in Jamaica, Queens, the NYPD said.

The Altima was traveling east on Jamaica Avenue at the time and had a Missouri license plate, police said. Jangel was taken to Jamaica Medical Center. He was not seriously injured, authorities said.

Jangel “has a foreign metal projective lodged in his forehead, lodged between his skin and his skull,” NYPD Officer Joseph Zvonik wrote in a court complaint filed against Ferebee.

Jangel’s “front driver’s side window was open, and he heard a pop sound and immediately felt a burning pain to his forehead,” according to the complaint.

Officers arrested Ferebee Saturday after an investigation and the circulation of surveillance photos police said showed her sitting in the Altima.

In the complaint, Ferebee is quoted telling investigators she didn’t remember much about the shooting or anything else that day.

“I don’t know if I had a gun. I don’t remember. I don’t know and I don’t remember if I discharged a gun in the car,” Ferrebee said, according to court papers. “You know why you have me here. Just book me.”

A car matching the description of the Altima has been linked to similar shootings at vehicles on Sunrise Highway on Long Island in which at least one victim was hit, according to prosecutor Sonia Kaczmarzyk, adding that video exists connecting the Altima to the shooting.

A Suffolk police spokeswoman said Sunday night that the department’s “Criminal Intelligence Bureau has provided assistance” to NYPD detectives on the case, but the department would not comment on the nature of the assistance.

David Blondell, Ferebee’s Legal Aid attorney, said she was charged merely for allegedly being in the area of the shooting.

“She’s being punished for being near where something happened,” he said.

Blondell said Ferebee is a lifelong Long Islander and the sole caretaker of her parents.

He said the video doesn’t show anyone pointing a weapon.