Tuesday, January 13, 2009

Lt Francis Cole Kills Wife then Himself

N.Y.

An NYPD lieutenant gunned down his wife and blew himself away Monday in an explosion of rage at their Long Island home, cops said.

Lt. Francis Cole, 48, who worked out of Brooklyn's 68th Precinct, stabbed his wife, Elana, 46, in the chest with a kitchen knife before shooting her in the head at their home in Centereach, police said.

He then shot himself in the head.

Cole's 18-year-old daughter tried to intervene before her parents' fight turned deadly, but was struck in the face, said Detective Lt. Jack Fitzpatrick of the Suffolk County Police.

The daughter called 911 at 12:35 p.m. to report her father had shot her mother, Fitzpatrick said.

"The Coles had been going through a divorce and apparently this is related," Fitzpatrick said.

He said there had been no prior calls to the couple's Savoy Court home.

Cole and his wife were found in the upstairs bedroom of their two-story house. He was still alive when cops found him and rushed him to Stony Brook University Medical Center, where he died.

Neighbors said they were stunned.

"There was no sign, never an argument, nothing," said Mike Arrigo. "They were an ideal family."

Besides the couple's teenage daughter, Elana Coles's 81-year-old mother was in the house at the time, Fitzpatrick said.

The couple is also survived by three sons, all in their 20s.

In 2005, Francis Cole was named in a racial discrimination suit filed by a black female officer in the 68th Precinct. The officer accused Cole of running an "old-boys club" within the NYPD that prevented her from being promoted.

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