With snow falling on thousands of heavy blue police coats, officers of the NYPD bid a final farewell early Friday morning to fallen 22-year-old rookie Police Officer Jason Rivera, one of two murdered on Jan. 21 by an ex-convict out on probation during a domestic violence call in Harlem.
Standing 20 deep for blocks along Fifth Avenue, the sea of blue stood motionless in the frigid temperatures as the snow fell, to honor the young police officer, promoted posthumously to detective first grade by Police Commissioner Keechant Sewell. New York State Troopers joined with the NYPD to pay their final respects to the fallen officer.
Today, a sea of blue lined 5th Avenue, stood 20 deep and shoulder to shoulder for blocks to honor hero NYPD Detective Jason Rivera. Detective Rivera was killed in the line of duty last Friday while protecting the citizens of . pic.twitter.com/vhII68wFtx
— NYPD Special Ops (@NYPDSpecialops)
Roman Catholic Cardinal Timothy Dolan presided over the emotional funeral service held at St. Patrick’s Cathedral in Manhattan.
The entire city turned out to pay their final respects to the young police officer – thousands of civilians — along with the entire NYPD force, FDNY, Governor Kathy Hochul, Mayor Eric Adams, Police Commissioner Keechant Sewall, former Police Commissioner Dermot Shea and members of the Police Benevolent Association.
Police Officer Jason Rivera rose to every challenge that crossed his path. He was everything that the city and NYPD needed him to be. It is with sincere admiration and appreciation that I promote him to Detective First Grade. . pic.twitter.com/TlqCSGxXVU
— Commissioner Sewell (@NYPDPC)
“This has always been a city of lights, and Police Officer Jason Rivera was one of its brightest,” Sewell said in her eulogy. “By all accounts Jason was wise beyond his years. His level of maturity at such a young age was noted repeatedly by his colleagues who remember how much they learned by simply being around him working side by side. He cherished the company of his colleagues, his brothers and sisters in blue.”
Today, members of the NYPD along with our brothers and sisters from various departments around the country, lined up shoulder to shoulder, block after block, to pay their final respects to Detective Jason Rivera. You will not be forgotten. Rest In Peace. pic.twitter.com/QWMcgveixI
— Asian Hate Crimes Task Force (@NYPDAsianHCTF)
The young couple met in elementary school. Back then, Dominique Luzuriaga said during her eulogy, she never thought their “innocent childhood love would lead us to marriage.
“Today, I’m still in this nightmare that I wish I never had. Full of rage and anger – hurt and sad, torn. . . Although I gained thousands of blue brothers and sisters, I’m the loneliest without you.”
“Although you won’t be here anymore, I want you to live through me. This system continues to fail us,” she charged.
“We are not safe anymore, not even the members of the service. I know you were tired of these laws, especially the ones from the new DA,” she said.
Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg has made multiple changes in his department in the few weeks he has been on the job, among them a policy change to avoid prosecutions for robberies and lesser crimes.
“I hope he’s watching you speak through me right now. I’m sure all of our blue family is tired too. But I promise – we promise – that your death won’t be in vain,” Rivera’s wife declared. Mourners in the cathedral gave her a standing ovation.
The young widow described how she and her husband had argued the morning of his murder – “you know it’s hard being a cop’s wife sometimes” — and how she had turned down a ride from him as they left their home together because she didn’t want to continue the fight. Rivera asked her then if she was sure she didn’t want him to take her home, because “It might be the last ride I give you,” he had told her. She declined, she recalled: “probably the biggest mistake I ever made.”
Hours later, she saw a notification on her Citizen app, showing two cops had been shot in Harlem. She immediately texted him but got no response.
“Are you okay? Please tell me you’re okay. I know that you’re mad right now but just text me, you’re okay, at least tell me you’re busy.” But there was no response, and when she checked his location on Find My iPhone she saw he was at Harlem Hospital. “I thought maybe you were sitting on a perp but still, nothing.”
Then she got the call “I wish none of you that are sitting here with me will ever receive,” asking if she was Jason’s wife and telling her to rush to the hospital.
“Walking all those steps seeing everybody staring at me was the scariest moment I’ve experienced. Nobody was telling me anything. Dozens of people were surrounding me and yet I felt alone.
“I couldn’t believe you left me. Seeing you in a hospital bed wrapped up in sheets, not hearing you when I was talking to you broke me,” she said, choking back tears.
She told those in the packed cathedral that her husband was “so happy” they all came to honor him and his service. It was “exactly how he would have wanted to be remembered; like a true hero,” she said.
“You have the whole nation on gridlock and although you won’t be here anymore, I want you to live through me. I love you until the end of time.
“We’ll take the watch from here.”
— David H – PBA Director s30 (@DHeskiel)
As for Manhattan District Attorney Bragg, he was indeed seated among the mourners and listening to the young widow’s words, according to law enforcement sources quoted by the New York Post.
Bragg later told reporters in a statement that “violence against police officers will never be tolerated. . . My office will vigorously prosecute cases of violence against police and work to prevent senseless acts like this from ever happening again.”
It wasn’t just New Yorkers who mourned Detective Rivera: thousands of cops from across the country and around the world joined in paying their final respects as well.
They will be back on Feb. 1 and 2, when the entire scenario again unfolds as mourners pay their final respects to Rivera’s partner, NYPD Officer Wilbert Mora, 27, who succumbed to a gunshot wound to the head two days after Rivera. The services for Mora will also be held at St. Patrick’s Cathedral.
The third police officer who was with Rivera and Mora returned fire at the shooter, Lawshawn McNeill, who was critically injured.
The killer used a stolen high-capacity magazine and handgun in his attack on the officers, according to Fox News. McNeill died of his wounds the day before Mora.