Surveillance Videos Offered Key Clues in Shooting Death of Rikers Island Officer

NEW YORK — After a motorcyclist opened fire Friday on Rikers Island correctional officer Jonathan Narain, following a brief exchange of words, killing him, investigators used surveillance videos to track the man to his home in Queens, police said.

A witness later identified the motorcyclist from a photo array, the police said, leading to Sunday’s arrest of Gifford Hunter, who worked maintaining buses for the Metropolitan Transportation Authority.

But Monday, a lawyer for Hunter challenged the underlying story as implausible.

“They’re saying he did all of this as a spur of the moment after a brief conversation,” Kenneth Finkelman, Hunter's lawyer, said. “The police claim of spontaneous road rage doesn’t make any sense.”

Hunter, 30, pleaded not guilty Monday to charges of second-degree murder and criminal possession of a weapon, and was ordered held without bail. Hunter, who lives in the St. Albans neighborhood of Queens, in New York, has no history of violence, Finkelman said. He has worked for the MTA since July 2017.

Narain’s relatives and dozens of correctional officers, some dressed in uniform, packed the courtroom and hallway of Queens Criminal Court in support of the slain officer.

“It was frustrating seeing that guy,” Narain’s co-worker, Richard Acevedo, said after the hearing. “I didn’t even want to look at him.”

The police have said that Narain, 27, was on his way to work Friday at Rikers Island when he stopped briefly at a store for food. He made a U-turn in his red Honda Accord, and had an angry encounter with Hunter, prosecutors said. When Narain stopped at a red light blocks away, at 120th Street and 103rd Avenue in Richmond Hill, the motorcyclist pulled up alongside Narain’s vehicle. The men spoke again, just before police said Hunter fired a shot at close range at Narain’s head.

“This was a coldhearted and senseless act of violence,” the Queens District Dttorney Richard A. Brown said in a statement.

Elias Husamudeen, president of the Correction Officers’ Benevolent Association, called on the district attorney “to prosecute this murderer to the fullest extent of the law.”

Hunter faces up to 25 years to life in prison if convicted.

Hours after Hunter’s arraignment, colleagues, friends and relatives gathered at the home of Narain’s family in the Richmond Hill neighborhood of Queens.

“He was full of life, a nice guy, always willing to help others,” said Capt. Ricky Jogie. “It’s tragic and senseless what happened. I felt angry he had the audacity to take a life.”