BY ALBERT AMATEAU | Last week, the Greenwich Village-Chelsea Chamber of Commerce (villagechelsea.com) honored four members of the Sixth, Ninth, 10th and 13th Precincts — covering Chelsea, the Union Square/Flatiron district, Greenwich Village and the East Village.
The Chamber’s eighth annual Safe City, Safe Streets luncheon honored four officers of the year.
Sgt. Duane Percy joined the NYPD in 2007, patrolling the Times Square Impact Zone in the Midtown South Precinct. In 2008, Percy came to the 10th Precinct covering Chelsea and the west side of midtown to 43rd Street.
He began his 10th Precinct career working in the Cabaret Unit. In January of this year, he moved to the precinct’s Midnight Conditions Unit (focusing on all quality of life issues facing the residents and business people of Chelsea).
Since the beginning of the year, Percy has made 43 arrests — seven of which were for felonies. He is honored for his commitment to Chelsea residents and to his fellow 10th Precinct officers.
Sgt. Gregory Abbott, leader of the Village’s Sixth Precinct Narcotics Enforcement Unit, was policing Christopher Street in July when he arrested a suspect who fought and made his escape, leaving Abbott with injuries that required hospitalization.
Just a few weeks later, Abbott (an 18-year NYPD veteran) returned to work — making as many as a dozen arrests per night with his team. The suspect who injured him, a violent career criminal who was on parole at the time for a felony offense, was apprehended later after a citywide search.
Police Officer Sergio De La Mota joined NYPD in January 2007 and was assigned to the East Village’s Ninth Precinct on June 28 of that year. His street observation skills became evident by his identifying and apprehending criminal suspects on his own initiative. As a member of the precinct’s uniformed Conditions Unit, De La Mota blends into the street scene without being detected by suspects. Over four years, he has made a total of 314 arrests (113 of them this year).
Officer Leonardo Nimo, a member of the 13th Precinct’s plainclothes Anti-Crime Team, made 436 arrests in his 10 years with NYPD. This year to date, he has more than 90 pick-up observation arrests — including 19 felonies in the precinct that covers the Union Square, Flatiron and Stuyvesant area.
In March, Nimo recognized and arrested a suspect wanted for a series of cell phone snatches from young women.
On May 27, while at home on his day off, Nimo received a phone call from an informant in the area about a suspect in several commercial robberies and two bank robberies. Via his cell phone, he coordinated the arrest of the suspect with his Anti-Crime teammates. In August of this year, Nimo helped the precinct’s homicide squad arrest a suspect wanted in a homicide the night before in Union Square Park.
