By Rocco Parascandola
New York Daily News
NEW YORK — NYPD Officers Wilbert Mora and Jason Rivera are forever honored in the Harlem stationhouse where they worked.
The young cops’ names were added to the memorial wall inside the 32nd Precinct stationhouse on Friday.
Mora, 27 and Rivera, 22, were gunned down on Jan. 21, when they responded to call for help from a woman whose son was threatening to hurt her. The woman’s son, Lashawn McNeil, 47, came out of a back bedroom and ambushed the officers before another cop shot him, authorities said.
Rivera died that night, Mora succumbed to his injuries four days later. The gunman also died.
Police Commissioner Keechant Sewell assured the officers’ families that the NYPD “would never forget our fallen.”
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“Their dedication to the Harlem community and the men and women of the NYPD was unwavering,” she said. “They were committed to the same mission that all those who wear our uniform swear to uphold.”
Mora and Rivera were posthumously promoted to detective.
The officers’ families remain angry about bail reform and other legislation that they believe has created a climate that demonizes cops and goes easy on criminals.
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“Neither the death of Wilbert, nor that of his partner, nor the pain of our families... much less my desperate calls, has made you do anything to change the condition that put them at such a disadvantage and vulnerable state in an NYPD uniform,” Mora’s sister Karina said in Spanish. “That’s why today I ask you again, ‘How many more Wilberts, how many more Jasons and how many more broken families do you need to take action?”
Rivera’s widow, Dominque Luzuriaga, kept politics out of her speech and instead focused on what she has lost.
“Although I was never ready for him to leave,” she said, “I was always ready for him to stay in my heart.
“Don’t forget to tell your favorite people that you love them today.”
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