Nassau police shoot knife-wielding man in the face in Westbury, commissioner says

A Nassau County police officer shot a knife-wielding man in the face after a late-night altercation in which the assailant emerged from a wooded area in Westbury and shattered a window of a patrol vehicle, Commissioner Patrick Ryder said Tuesday.

The man accused in the attack late Monday, Adrian Thompson, 27, lives with his parents in Westbury and had previously been a medical student at Columbia University, Ryder said at a news conference at police headquarters in Mineola.

About 11 p.m. on Monday, police received a call regarding a man acting irrationally and attempting to stab people with a knife, according to Ryder.

Ryder said a bureau of special operations team was responding to an unrelated call near a wooded area on Brush Hollow Road in the vicinity of 2nd Street when they saw a person matching the description.

As they approached the area, Thompson allegedly came running out from behind some bushes and smashed the passenger window of their patrol vehicle with a knife, shattering the glass.

"They didn't get a chance to even get out of their car when he charged the vehicle and started smashing," the police commissioner said of the officers.

The officer on that side of the vehicle turned as the knife came through the window and fired several shots but none hit Thompson, who then ran toward the back of the vehicle, Ryder said.

The officer in the driver's seat got out, confronted the man at the rear of the car and fired once, striking him in the face.

Thompson was transported to Nassau University Medical Center in East Meadow, where doctors said he is recovering from the bullet that went through his cheek, according to Ryder.

Thompson had an interaction with police on April 13 related to mental health, Ryder added. A Nassau police spokesperson did not have additional information late Tuesday regarding the interaction.

He faces two counts of menacing a police officer. Ryder said they are determining whether to file any upgraded charges after speaking with the Nassau County District Attorney’s office.

He was expected to have a bedside arraignment at the hospital on Tuesday, according to police.

At the news conference, Ryder held up a box containing the knife police said Thompson was carrying. Photos of the knife and Thompson's mug shot were also displayed.

Ryder said no one else was injured.

"It's a tough day," he said. "No officer ever comes to want to fire that weapon, but they're going to do what they have to do to protect themselves and our communities. And this is the decision that gets made within a second."

One bullet fired during the incident may have entered a residence on Talbot Drive. Sarai Montoya, 17, said she was getting ready to go to sleep when she felt "a shock" in her house.

"I thought it was electrical problems," the incoming high school senior said. "It was so weird."

When she went to her parents’ bedroom to share what happened, she noticed smoke. The family went outside to learn a bullet fired by an officer had gone through her parents’ second-floor bedroom window.

Montoya later discovered the bullet had traveled through the walls and hit her bedroom closet.

"Seconds before the [bullet] went to my mom's window, she got up to go use the bathroom," Montoya said. "So if she would have gotten up a little later, God knows what could have happened."

Another bullet apparently left a hole in the family’s white fence. The hole was circled in blue police spray paint.

A Nassau police spokesperson could not comment on whether the apparent bullet holes at the Talbot Drive residence were caused by the officer-involved shooting.