By John Valenti
Newsday
An attempted traffic stop in Hempstead ended with the suspect being shot after he tried to run over a police officer on a dead-end street early Friday in Merrick, police said.
No police officers were injured in the incident.
Dorian Getlin, 38, of 32 Gerhard Rd. in Plainview, was charged with first-degree reckless endangerment, fifth-degree criminal possession of a control substance and resisting arrest.
The suspect was struck once in the left arm and chest and was taken to Nassau University Medical Center in East Meadow, where he was in stable condition. Getlin’s family declined to comment Friday.
The Hempstead Police Department did not identify the Hempstead officer who fired.
Only one shot was fired, after the suspect made a U-turn across a lawn and attempted to run down a Nassau officer, Nassau and Hempstead police said. Hempstead police carry 9-mm Glock handguns, Hempstead Police Lt. Scott Donohue said Friday afternoon.
The chase began after uniformed Hempstead officers in a marked patrol car saw what appeared to be a drug deal on Terrace Avenue in Hempstead. In what Donohue called “a low-speed pursuit,” Hempstead police followed the 1992 Cadillac driven by the suspect through Hempstead and into Merrick.
There, following a radio call, at least one unit from Nassau police joined in.
The chase wound up on a dead-end block near the corner of Bushwick Avenue and Nassau Street at about 2:45 a.m., and when officers got out of their cars and approached the vehicle, police said, the driver made the U-turn and attempted to run over the Nassau officer.
The unidentified Hempstead officer then fired one shot through the driver’s side window, police said, hitting the suspect.
Staff writer Joseph Mallia contributed to this story.
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