By Matthew Chayes
Newsday
NEW YORK — Randolph Holder Jr.’s father says he still cries remembering his son, an NYPD officer who was shot dead while chasing a suspect in 2015.
Friday was bittersweet for the Holder family as a Queens street was named Detective Randolph Holder Way, near their Far Rockaway home.
“We put up signs to remember heroes of the NYPD,” said Police Commissioner James O’Neill. “Maybe someday, some young man or young girl will look up at that sign, and someone will tell them what a good person Randolph Holder was and what a great job he did.”
Holder, a Guyanese-born 33-year-old on the force for five years, was shot in the head in East Harlem in October 2015 while chasing Tyrone Howard, who had just stolen a bike at gunpoint. Holder was posthumously promoted to detective soon afterward.
In April, Howard was sentenced to life imprisonment without parole.
Holder’s father, Randolph Holder Sr., said he finds himself “shedding tears . . . thinking about my son, that I do not have him here anymore.”
“My son was a good disciplined guy, man, officer and a gentleman, and he died doing what he did best,” said Holder Sr., who called Howard “that beast” during sentencing.
The street, named under legislation passed last year by the City Council, is at the intersection of Collier Avenue and Briar Place, between Beach 25th and Beach 22nd streets. It retains its geographic designation.
“He gave of himself to make our community a safer place,” said council speaker Melissa Mark-Viverito.
https://twitter.com/NYPDONeill/status/893545323515301888
———
©2017 Newsday