NEW YORK — After days of searching the waters of the Harlem River, police divers on Sunday located what officials believe is the gun used to fatally shoot a plainclothes New York City police officer last week, a law enforcement official said.
The gun was found around 3 a.m. near 123d Street in the river, near where the magazine was recovered hours after the shooting, police said.
“It fits all the characteristics,” Deputy Chief William Aubry, the commander of Manhattan detectives, said.
The location of the gun, a semi-automatic .40-caliber weapon believed to have been fired one time — striking Officer Randolph Holder in the head — had been the main open question in the investigation into the death of the officer on Tuesday.
Officials believed the handgun was thrown into the Harlem River as the suspect in the killing, Tyrone Howard, fled along the promenade between the river and Franklin D. Roosevelt Drive.
On Sunday, police closed a long stretch of the busy road to search for the bullet from the weapon, and possibly the gun itself, after days of searching in the murky waters.
But just as they were preparing to conduct that search, the official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss the continuing investigation, said divers had found the gun in the water.
The weapon would probably figure as among the most important pieces of evidence in the trial of Howard, who was charged last week in the killing, which followed a shootout in a public-housing project several blocks south. Three men are still sought in that shooting. With the gun in hand, investigators can also trace its origin.
Holder was the fourth on-duty New York City officer to be killed in a 10-month span; the earlier three deaths all came at the hands of guns brought illegally to the city from Southern states.
About 200 people joined family and friends of Holder for a vigil in Queens Saturday.