He wasn’t suicidal — he was cooking soup.
An 86-year-old Brooklyn man who was Tasered twice by cops responding to a call about a suicidal man in his 20s is suing the city because he says they zapped the wrong guy.
“It is scary to think that our police force has such a lack of communication amongst each other,” said lawyer Scott Rynecki, who notified the city that he intends to file a $5 million lawsuit alleging that John Antoine, the lucky-to-be-alive octogenarian, was the victim of excessive force and was falsely charged with harassment.
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Antoine was in the kitchen, holding a knife in one hand and an onion in the other, when cops burst into his Bergen St. apartment Oct. 14, according to the notice of claim. A pot of soup was simmering on the stove.
“What makes this more outrageous is that members of the Police Department were given information that the situation they were called to involved a 23-year-old male,” Rynecki said. “And they were in possession of that individual’s name.”
The cops were supposed to be looking for the 23-year-old boyfriend of Antoine’s granddaughter, who was said to be acting emotionally disturbed after he ran out of his meds.
A representative of the family’s health insurance provider had spoken to Antoine’s granddaughter about the situation earlier that afternoon and called the 63rd Precinct to report the young man was suicidal. Because the residence was actually located in a different precinct, a precinct cop called 911 and gave the dispatcher the boyfriend’s name and age.
A review of dispatcher tapes by the Daily News clearly shows the botched confrontation was the result of lapses in information provided to patrol cops.
The dispatcher notified cops in the 77th Precinct, but told them the only information she had was that there was a suicidal man at that address. She tried calling the 63rd Precinct back, but got a recorded message.
Meanwhile, Antoine’s granddaughter and her boyfriend had gone out to get the prescription refilled, according to the notice of claim. Antoine buzzed the cops into the building, thinking his granddaughter had returned. The cops found the apartment door ajar and confronted Antoine, ordering him to drop the knife.
“The police came in and say, ‘You so and so, put down the knife,’ and I said, ‘Why are you coming in my apartment? What do you want?’ ” Antoine, a retired pipefitter, told The News. “They wouldn’t tell me.”
Antoine said he turned to place the knife on the kitchen table and felt pain in the back of his head. “I felt like I was dead,” he said. One of the cops, a sergeant, fired a Taser into Antoine’s neck — which is not a recommended procedure — and the leg.
Police took Antoine to two hospitals and in each case, doctors found him to be mentally fit. He was later charged with harassment for his refusal to drop the knife.
The NYPD said the cops responded in appropriate fashion. A police spokesman commended the sergeant for not shooting Antoine.
“The individual he encountered inside the residence was armed with a large kitchen knife and was in immediate proximity to both the sergeant and a 3-year-old who was present in the residence,” the spokesman said. “The individual refused to comply with the sergeant’s commands to drop the knife, instead making statements to the effect, ‘I am not going to jail, I’m not going to the hospital.’ “