State Attorney General Eric Schneiderman’s office said Tuesday it has launched a full investigation into the road rage shooting death of a Brooklyn man at the hands of an off-duty police officer.
“The Attorney General has determined that this case falls within the parameters of the (Governor’s) Executive Order and has launched a full investigation,” a spokesman for the office said.
The fight escalated after Delrawn Small, 37, got out of his car and started punching officer Wayne Isaacs, 37, at Atlantic Ave. and Bradford St. in East New York.
Security video of the shooting shows Small leaning into the cop’s car, sources said.
Police have viewed the video but not made it public.
The attorney general’s office has already obtained a search warrant for Isaac’s car. The investigation will be led by Alvin Bragg, the chief of the Attorney General’s Special Investigations and Prosecutions Unit.
Small leaned in through the window of Issac’s car moments before the gunfire erupted, sources said. Small then stumbled backward and fell to the ground, the video shows, sources said.
Small became irate after Isaacs cut him off and got out of his car at a stoplight.
Small’s girlfriend Zaquanna Albert, 35, told investigators she begged him not to leave the car and confront Isaacs, sources said Monday. She also told authorities Small had had three drinks at a cookout earlier in the day, the sources said.
The video supports the account that Small attacked Isaacs first — and Isaacs never left his car until the shooting was over.
A witnesse had told the Daily News on Monday the officer had stepped out of his vehicle.
Meanwhile, Small’s niece sharply criticized Isaacs in comments to reporters Tuesday — and appeared to be addressing her comments directly at the cop.
“It’s not over for you,” Zoe Dempsey raged, referring to Isaacs. “You’re not going to walk away from this. We’ll find you.”
Dempsey and other relatives of Small spoke about the case at his uncle’s home in Brooklyn.
“He’s got to get what he deserves because this is not OK,” she added. “You can’t just pull out your gun and shoot somebody.”
In addition to the Schneiderman probe, the NYPD is conducting an administrative probe into the incident.
There will be a candlelight vigil at the scene of the shooting at 7 p.m. Wednesday, the family said.
“Why they would shoot him is unbelievable to me,” said the uncle, Guy Dempsey, who himself was shot 12 times by police in 1972. He later sued the NYPD with the help of the New York Civil Liberties Union.
Zoe Dempsey went on to question why Isaacs was carrying his weapon off-duty and called the 79th Precinct, where Isaacs worked, “vile.” She insisted that the family just wants justice.
Cops routinely carry their weapons off-duty. Many have other handguns they only carry when they are off-duty.
“He should not have shot this man in the head in front of his family,” she said, adding that she hopes to see that “(Isaacs) gets arrested and put in jail for a very long time. I want the 79th Precinct to go through training again.”
Small had been arrested 19 prior times, and served time in state prison, records show.
Zoe Dempsey acknowledged that her uncle had been in trouble in the past, but he had changed his ways in recent years.
“He just had a baby, of course he’s changed,” she said. “He’s been doing what he has to do for himself. He found peace within himself and at some point it (criminal behavior) stopped.”
