A young, off-duty NYPD officer was killed early Saturday in a horrifying one-car crash along FDR Drive. He dreamed of one day becoming a detective.
Brooklyn-born cop Garman Chen was traveling “at a high rate of speed” north on the highway near East 23rd Street at about 2:30 a.m. when he lost control of his black 2016 Lexus, slamming into a barrier pole supporting a pedestrian footbridge, police and sources said.
The Midwood High School graduate, who was with the department just three years, was taken to Bellevue Hospital, where he was pronounced dead.
Injured were Chen’s two passengers: Kenneth Larken, 25, an off-duty FDNY firefighter assigned to Ladder Co. 10 in Manhattan who suffered body trauma, and Amanda Remy, 25, whose right foot was severed, police sources said.
Both were taken to Bellevue and were listed in stable condition, police said. Larken — who has been on the job for two months — and Remy are dating, an FDNY source said.
Footage obtained by The Post shows Chen flying down the northbound lane, and investigators told The Post he may have been “racing” the car driven by the cameraman
The footage shows Chen’s Lexus passing another car on the left, and then moments later, zooming past a driver in a blue BMW on the right, and then losing control of his ride.
The BMW driver, “Justin,” was filming, and estimated he was traveling at 45-50 mph while Chen was “going 60, 70 (mph).” The speed limit on the FDR is 40 mph.
Chen was assigned to the 76th Precinct stationhouse in Carroll Gardens, where black and purple bunting hung above the entrance by late Saturday afternoon.
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