A NYPD officer fatally shot a man who burst into a Brooklyn synagogue screaming "kill the Jews" before stabbing a man in the head with an nine-inch knife early Tuesday morning.
When police arrived at the scene, they ordered the suspect identified as Calvin Peters, 49, to put down the knife he jammed into 22-year-old Isralei student Levi Rosenblatt's head. Peters refused to put down the knife in an intense confrontation in a graphic video obtained by New York Daily News.
"He was going towards the officer," said witness Yechi Hamlech, 19. "His eyes were bulging, he must have been on drugs."
As the suspect approached the cop - still holding the nine-inch blade - the officers on the scene are repeatedly yelling "Drop the f-----g knife" at Peters. One officer is shown in the video pointing a gun at him.
The officer pointing the gun let a single shot ring out, puncturing Peters in the stomach. Peters was handcuffed after falling to the floor and rushed to Kings County Hospital where he died from his wound at 3:15 a.m, New York Daily News reported.
A 25-year-old unnamed witness said Peters looked "not so much crazy, but different" when he first entered the 24-hour religious center. He said Peters briefly left before returning with the knife in his hand yelling "I will kill the Jew! I want to kill the Jew!"
"I never thought it would happen in New York," the witness said. "These things don't need to happen."
If it weren't for the police intervention Rabbi Motti Seligson, a synagogue representative, fears Peters' attack could have been much worse, New York Daily News reported.
Peters "has a history of acting out in other places," said Deputy Commissioner of Intelligence and Counterterrorism John Miller, who also called Peters "mentally disturbed."
Police sources reported that Peters has been arrested 19 times stretching back to 1982 in both New York and Nassau County. The majority of the arrests were for drug possession.
Synagogue members said Rosenblatt is in stable condition.
