A slain member of New York’s Finest who made the ultimate sacrifice serving and protecting the Upper East Side, who then spent more than a century resting in an unmarked grave, finally received a special honor Friday morning, ensuring his name will never again be forgotten.
“Do you believe in miracles?” asked Maureen O’Grady, the elderly granddaughter of NYPD Patrolman John Patrick Flood, during Friday morning’s unveiling of an Upper East Side street corner co-named for the fallen officer.
“Today’s ceremony is the epitome of that phrase coming true. It’s not the only words, but takes place every day, in the precincts and the hearts of the members of the department,” O’Grady told the small crowd assembled at the corner of East 77th Street and York Avenue.
On July 3, 1917, Patrolman John P. Flood was minutes from wrapping up his tour of duty around 4:00 pm, chatting with his wife on an Upper East Side street corner about a floral arrangement for an upcoming funeral, when a woman ran up pleading for help. A man inside Kitty Mannix’s Lenox Hill apartment would hurt or even kill her.
Mannix told Patrolman Flood that 28-year-old boxer Milton Bleier was waiting for her inside her second-floor tenement at 502 East 77th Street, warning him the pint-sized prizefighter standing 5’5″ tall might fight him.
ALSO READ | Man Dies 10 Days After Being Struck by Truck while Crossing Second Avenue
“I guess there won’t be much to this. Just wait until I come back,” the 37-year-old cop told his wife before heading to Mannix’s home, the New York Times reported.
Flood would never return. The officer went with Mannix to her building. While she stayed downstairs with her sister, Flood entered the apartment. Bleier ambushed the policeman, stole his nightstick and bludgeoned the father of three to death, fracturing the NYPD officer’s skull in both the front and back.
Patrolman Flood died on the floor of Mannix’s apartment before a doctor arrived, while Bleier escaped following the murder.
The next day, a report in The Bridgeport Farmer, a Connecticut newspaper, noted the boxer was well known in that city and could be heading there. The report added that Bleier was allegedly a sex trafficker trying to collect money from Mannix, who had been threatened with violence if she didn’t pony up more cash.
Though his killer admitted to using the patrolman’s baton against him, the depraved depths of violence inside the UES apartment initially led investigators to believe the killer crushed Flood’s skull with a hammer or axe, according to reporting at the time in both the New York Times and New York Sun.
A 1917 crime scene photo unearthed from the New York City Municipal Archives by Upper East Site shows the slain officer’s body lying on the floor of Ms. Mannix’s apartment, his head in a pool of blood with spatter covering a tablecloth and nearby wall.
Cops finally collared Bleier six months later, on January 30, 1918, in Sparrow Point, Maryland, located outside of Baltimore, states an entry in that year’s NYPD Annual Report. The pugilist pleaded guilty to Second Degree Murder and received a sentence of 20 years to life in prison.
ALSO READ | Man Beaten Bloody in Brutal UES Subway Assault: NYPD
Patrolman Flood’s story would not end there.
Eulogized at his funeral by NYPD Chaplain John Cogan and remembered as courageous, the beloved officer was laid to rest at Cavalry Cemetery in Queens.
“One cannot say too much in commendation of this brave man who died in the performance of his duty,” said Father Coogan, “He was not only brave, but sympathetic, and a great influence for good among the boys of the east side.”
“He was so averse to the use of profanity that he was known as ‘the parish priest,'” Cogan continued, “Surely, that was a strange title for a policeman, but it shows how a New York policeman can endear himself to the public.”
One of seven NYPD officers to lose their lives in the line of duty serving the Upper East Side, Flood’s face is among those displayed proudly on a memorial wall of honor inside the 19th Precinct station house, located on East 67th Street.
In 2017, Upper East Side cops from the NYPD 19th Precinct — Flood’s precinct — went to Queens to pay their respects to their fallen comrade and mark the solemn anniversary. They found no headstone, just grass.
Active and retired Upper East Side cops, led by Detective Anthony Nuccio, then raised $9,000 to get the slain officer a proper headstone, which was installed in 2019.
“Despite a proper NYPD funeral, Patrolman Flood’s wife was unable to afford a headstone for him,” explained NYC Council Member Julie Menin during Friday morning’s tribute, “It would be literally over a century before one was made for him, all in part to the efforts of Detective Nuccio.”
The sound of bagpipes filled the air as an NYPD Ceremonial Unit color guard carried the flags of our county, city, and police force.
ALSO READ | UES Couple Helps Rescue Drowning Man from East River
The corner of East 77th Street and York Avenue is now co-named Patrolman John Patrick Flood Way; a blue sign featuring the NYPD shield will ensure Upper East Side residents never forget the slain officer’s name or sacrifice for our community.
“Times may change. Things may change,” explained Deputy Inspector Bill Gallagher, commanding officer of the 19th Precinct, “But the New York Police Department continues day in and day out to serve people, to protect people and to keep them safe.”
“Hopefully, precinct members will continue to receive daily inspiration as they pass the [memorial] wall on the way to their tours [of duty],” Flood’s granddaughter told her fellow family members, police officers and community members and present.
“My constant prayer is that no additions ever get made to that wall,” O’Grady added.
