An off-duty cop shot and killed an armed man who attacked the officer’s elderly father on a Washington Heights street corner last night, police said.
The dead man, in his late 20s, grabbed the arm of the cop’s dad at the corner of 178th Street and St. Nicholas Avenue at about 7:45 p.m., police said.
The officer then fired two to three shots at the man, hitting him once in the chest.
The man stumbled away from the scene and collapsed a block away.
He was taken to Columbia-Presbyterian Hospital where he died about 40 minutes later.
Police said they were investigating whether the man was trying to commit a robbery.
Cops recovered at the scene a .32-caliber gun that they said belonged to the dead man.
But it was unclear if he was displaying it when the officer fired, sources said
Neither the off-duty cop nor the man he shot was identified by police.
The officer and his dad were unhurt.