Melvin Hopkins was 39 when he was killed on a Saturday evening in September 1979 while off duty outside his uncle’s liquor store at Nostrand Avenue and Atlantic Avenue in Bedford-Stuyvesant, Brooklyn. He had been standing guard as the store was closing after earlier helping a bartender across the street eject a troublemaker. The same man returned, was told the store was closed, produced a .25 caliber handgun and an exchange of gunfire followed. Hopkins was mortally wounded; the assailant took Hopkins’ service weapon and fled.

A 21-year-old suspect was arrested a few days later and charged in the killing; prosecutors established a connection between that suspect and the earlier bar incident. After a trial the suspect was convicted of murder on July 8, 1980, and received a 25 years to life sentence. Hopkins had served ten years with the NYPD in the 77th Precinct and was a Vietnam veteran who left behind a wife, son and daughter.