NYPD Officers From LI Shot In Line Of Duty Return Home

LINDENHURST, NY — Two NYPD police officers from Long Island got a special Thanksgiving homecoming after recovering from shooting in Queens earlier this week.

On Tuesday, Christopher Wells and another officer, Joseph Murphy, a Nassau County resident, were both shot in an exchange of gunfire.

The shootout occurred with a CUNY peace officer whose wife had just reported a domestic violence incident, according to the NYPD. The suspect, 41-year-old Rondell Goppy, was killed in the shootout.

Both officers were responding to a call of a domestic incident at a Springfield Gardens home when Goppy ambushed them and started shooting, NYPD Commissioner Dermot Shea said in a news briefing. The officers were taken to Jamaica Hospital, where they were awake and stable Tuesday afternoon but require surgery, Shea said.

On Thursday, 36-year-old Wells was released from the hospital, in time for Thanksgiving. His wife, Leslie Wells, told News12 that the shooting occurred on Wells' second day back at work since the birth of the couple's son born last month. The two also have a 3-year-old son.

"I’m just excited to have him close by, where he can see his 3-year-old and his baby," Leslie told News12. "I think that will help him heal too.”

Wells, who was wheeled out of the hospital alongside Murphy, suffered from a broken femur and will have to undergo a six month recovery process.

"We are just so grateful these officers are going to be able to get home, sit on the couch and watch some football with their beautiful families," Shea told the NY Daily News.