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Two men from Georgia involved in a deadly takedown inside a suburban New York City convenience store when their alleged accomplice was killed after he shot a police officer will face federal charges, authorities said Thursday.
Bryce Martin, 23, of Hampton, and Xavier Simms, 24, of Covington, are each charged with one count of conspiring to traffic firearms. The pair is accused of conspiring to traffic guns from Georgia to New York with a third suspect, identified as 28-year-old Bryant Jackson.
Martin and Simms appeared in federal court Thursday. During a news conference, the Yonkers Police Department released surveillance footage of Wednesday’s attack.
Authorities at the scene of a shooting in which a Yonkers, New York police officer was shot and a suspect was killed. A Yonkers police officer was shot Wednesday while trying to arrest three suspects during a joint investigation with the FBI. The suspect was killed when an FBI agent returned fire.
(KTTV)
A joint take force made up of plainclothes Yonkers police officers and FBI agents was conducting an illegal gun investigation when they tried arresting several suspects on Elm Street just after 2 p.m.
The suspects ran into the store, commonly referred to in the New York area as a bodega, followed by officers who converged on the property. Jackson allegedly fired a gun from his pocket and struck Yonkers Police Det. Brian Menton after he was prevented from walking out of the store.
An FBI agent returned fire, killing Jackson, police said. Menton was wounded in the stomach and taken to a hospital where he is still recovering. He sustained damage to his colon, intestines, kidneys and lost a “tremendous” amount of blood, Yonkers Police Commissioner John Mueller said Wednesday.
Menton, a 27-year veteran of the police force, was shot days before his scheduled retirement, officials said.
Security footage shows alleged gunman Bryant Jackson, 28, shooting a Yonkers police officer before being fatally shot by an FBI agent on Wednesday.
(Yonkers Police Department)
No other task force members opened fire, police said. They were not wearing body cameras.
Authorities did not release the names of the federal agent who killed Jackson. Four guns were recovered after the shooting, including two at the scene, authorities said. A federal complaint said cellphones belonging to the suspects showed they both had access to specialized firearms, including machine gun-style weapons.
New York officials and authorities have long credited the flow of firearms from states like Georgia with less stringent gun laws for crimes committed in the city.
Yonkers officials said the shooting occurred in an area that is no stranger to gun violence. Mueller cited the shooting of a 6-year-old boy last year two blocks from Wednesday’s crime scene.
A federal complaint alleges two Georgia men conspired to smuggle firearms to New York. This images shows was taken from the cell phone of one of the suspects, authorities said.
(Justice Department)
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The shooting was the third in Yonkers this year, compared to 21 last year, officials said. Other people in the store at the time of the gunfire have open gun charges but were not arrested.
Martin and Simms face up to five years in prison.
