The Brooklyn NYPD captain who balked at going to a hospital when two officers were shot has been demoted to lieutenant. The Daily News reports that the department's bosses accused former captain Scott Forster of gross negligence for skipping out on helping the cops injured in a shootout in Bedford-Stuyvesant on February 20th.
The shooting took place at about 3:20 a.m., and paramedics transported the injured officers to Kings County Hospital Center in East Flatbush, part of the precinct where Forster was second-in-command. Forster was supposed to coordinate the arrival of high-ranking officers and family members of the injured cops at the hospital, but the shooting happened 40 minutes before the end of his shift, and when his bosses called telling him to come help, he said it wasn't his problem, according to the New York Post.
Forster was stripped of his gun and badge and transferred to desk duty at the 52nd Precinct in the northern Bronx, according to the Post, a serious schlep for the Staten Islander. The tabloid reported that further investigation showed that Forster never personally signed off on his precinct's command log at the end of the 7 p.m.-4 a.m. shift, and instead had a subordinate do it for him. He reportedly told investigators that he may have left early the night of the shooting because he was sick to his stomach.
