Even the bad guys are dispensing advice on how to make the city safe.
“This could be avoided if you just get the drugs off the street,” Lawrence Downey, a career criminal accused of fatally knifing a WWE star’s brother, told cops as he was collared for the brazen killing in front of a Midtown pizzeria last month.
Downey, 59, whose rap sheet stretches back to 1995, even pointed out to the arresting officers from the Midtown South Precinct, “It’s so bad right now (it’s) on your own block.”
The precinct, which covers Madison Square Garden, Grand Central Terminal, Port Authority Bus Terminal and Times Square, has become a microcosm of the city’s spiraling lawlessness, say frustrated law enforcement sources struggling to keep the heart of Manhattan safe amid slashed budgets and no-show city services.
The killing of 39-year-old Ronald Massaro was the second murder in the precinct this year, up from one in 2019. Burglaries increased 108% with 328 through Dec. 6 compared to 155 last year, and robberies rose 21% with 157 this year from 130 last year. There were three shootings up from none in 2019.
Blatant drug use continues to plague the streets with junkies fueling an “eco-system” of crime just as the defund the police movement gains steam.
“You couldn’t have a worse set of circumstances in a sense that you have [people] released from jail and deinstitutionalized people in the middle of a pandemic with no aftercare or after-supervision. No thought even given to that,” said Eugene O’Donnell, a former NYPD officer and prosecutor who teaches at John Jay College of Criminal Justice.
O’Donnell said the city has spent “uncounted amounts of money purportedly to make mental health better” but that “the evidence is all around that that’s a farce.”
One veteran law enforcement source said he had never seen outreach workers from Thrive NYC, the billion-dollar mental health initiative spearheaded by Chirlaine McCray, Mayor de Blasio’s wife.
“I see thousands of people out here that need services,” the source said, adding the addicts were “committing burglaries, robberies, larcenies” to get their fix.
Massaro — brother of WWE star Ashley Massaro, who committed suicide in 2019 — had gotten out of rehab only hours before he got into an argument with Downey, sources said.
The two brawled, possibly over drugs, sources said, in front of the Fairfield Inn on West 40th Street, where cops say Downey was staying. Authorities say Downey was then caught on surveillance following Massaro down Eighth Avenue before plunging a 6-inch kitchen knife into him. He casually walked away, according to video viewed by The Post.
“I know why you’re here,” Downey told cops when they showed up at his room, before giving his assessment on what’s ruining the city’s quality of life.
Downey, whose priors including a strangulation charge last year along with previous narcotics and assault arrests, clammed up once he got to the stationhouse, sources said.
“It’s easy to say that it’s just about one thing. Weed. Heroin. But there’s a cascade effect,” the law enforcement source said of the conditions they’re encountering on the street. “When we’re not able to take care of the little things, the big things start happening.”
Bail reform, with its revolving-door justice, and defund the police efforts have tied the hands of cops.
“There’s no deterrence, even if you get arrested, you’re not going to jail. … And why are politicians scratching their heads? Because they can’t point the finger at themselves for all these bad decisions, and this is the most popular vote-getting tool right now — the anti-police vote,” said Joseph Giacalone, a former NYPD detective sergeant who is a now a John Jay adjunct professor.
Korey McMillan wasn’t even trying to hide from cops when he was allegedly found on Oct. 21 with at least 200 bags of heroin, a scalpel, a forged driver’s license and stolen credit card — but despite 16 prior arrests, including eight felonies, McMillan was back on the street a day later.
As the pandemic has kept Manhattan’s normally teeming streets virtually empty of office workers and tourists, druggies have established an audacious presence.
“It’s a ghost town,” said one law enforcement source of Midtown’s Eighth Avenue corridor. “Addicts are not going to dark alleys anymore. They’re doing it in plain sight. Broad daylight. They don’t care.”
Lance Fair, 30, is a prime example of the criminal “eco-system” that’s taken root, sources said.
Police spotted Fair splayed out on a sidewalk on Dec. 6, around the corner from the Midtown South headquarters on West 35th Street.
The officers tried to engage Fair in conversation but he became erratic, making sudden movements into his pockets and under his clothes, despite pleas to keep his hands visible.
Fair pulled a syringe from his clothes and abruptly injected himself right in front of two cops. He told officers “I don’t want to go to jail sick.”
“If he’s willing to do that with two cops standing there, what is he willing to do when he’s alone?” a veteran cop said.
Fair, who’s previously been arrested at least eight times for grand larceny and robbery in other parts of Midtown, was cuffed without incident.
Just down the block and 15 minutes later, officers spotted another familiar face: an emotionally disturbed woman who was an addict and was known, one cop said, for bizarrely putting her mouth on door handles.
A high-ranking law enforcement source said, “These individuals are deserving of our empathy. Leaving these conditions unchecked so others can be victimized as a consequence is not an answer.”