On November 13, 1989, 46-year-old New York City Police Detective Richard Guerzon was fatally shot while being transported back to Rikers Island from the Queens District Attorney’s Office. Guerzon, a 20-year veteran assigned to the Queens DA’s Squad, was riding with his partner, Detective Keith L. Williams, and a 25-year-old prisoner, Jay Harrison. Earlier that day Harrison had been left handcuffed to a pipe in a room and was able to break into a nearby locker and steal a handgun.

While driving on the Grand Central Parkway near LaGuardia Airport, Harrison produced the concealed weapon and ordered the detectives to pull over. After the car stopped he shot both officers from behind, striking each three times. Harrison used the detectives’ keys to free himself, dragged Guerzon’s body from the vehicle in an attempted car theft, and fled on foot. He was captured about ten hours later at a woman’s home in East New York, Brooklyn, and later charged with murder, escape, and weapons possession.

The killings exposed major procedural failures, including the unsecured locker and inadequate supervision of the prisoner, which prompted changes in how firearms are secured and prisoners are handled. Does anyone have memories of Detective Guerzon or information about that November 1989 transport?