Paul Bass Photo
Ryan Przybylski figured he’d be breaking up a fight among drunks when the bars let out. He didn’t anticipate a gunshot going off right behind his head.
Not that that was so unusual, either.
Like other cops who regularly patrol the weekend downtown nightclub district, Przybylski has come to expect “chaos” at 2 a.m. on downtown streets. He has come to expect to be outnumbered by swarms of violent bar patrons. He and his colleagues have developed both a mindset and a strategy for keeping the peace.
After the gunshot went off early this past Sunday morning, after other similar incidents within 25 hours, officials have decided cops like Przybylski need more officers alongside them to handle the chaos. The series of incidents has prompted a short-term promise — more cops patrolling outside downtown bars this weekend — and a discussion about longer-term fixes. (Read about that here.)
At closing time early Saturday, as many as four floating fights broke out. Two men were shot.
The next night, before closing time, cops conducted another in a series of raids that found underaged drinkers in one club.
At closing time, another set of fights broke out. Przybylski was ready. In four years working regular overtime shifts in the bar district (on top of his regular Newhallville patrol beat), Przybylski has learned what to expect, and how to deal with an assignment unlike others in the department.
“It’s a given,” he said of the fights. “Everyone’s drunk and riled up.”
Experience on that assignment adds a “skill set” to what cops learn on neighborhood beats, observed Lt. Jeff Hoffman, who supervises patrol. He said that has paid off for both Przybylski and the city at large.
“Police officers like him in New Haven don’t even realize how good they are. They don’t realize the skills that they’re honing,” Hoffman said. “He doesn’t have that much time on [the force]; I trust him like I would trust a veteran of 20 years because of all the situations he’s been in and the good judgment. He’s versatile. He has become a journeyman in a variety of circumstances. An officer like that you can put anywhere.”
Przybylski, who’s 27, headed to the College-Crown bar district last Saturday after completing his regular 3 – 11 p.m. shift in Newhallville, where the department has assigned him for most of his five and a half years on the force.
He comes to the shift mentally prepared to handle chaos. He expected a busy night: It’s always busy, especially at 2 a.m. when hundreds of besotted club patrons swarm onto Chapel, College, Crown, and Temple streets and the plaza behind the club Pulse. They move in all directions, with fights regularly breaking out. Only six to eight overtime cops are on duty to handle all that flow, Przybylski said. They work in teams of two; Saturday night he was paired with Officer Ross Van Nostrand.
He said he expected even more trouble than usual because the Lazy Lizard on Crown Street featured a hip-hop event that night. The district’s closing-hour crowds, which are largely suburban, always get into fights over “nonsense,” according Przybylski; they seem to get into more altercations on hip-hop nights.
And the total number of cops in the district has dwindled over the years since many clubowners stopped hiring additional cops to work their establishments (a result, some say, of the department’s discontinuation of a “hold-down” hiring system).
Sure enough, as the Lazy Lizard let out, the sidewalk filled with carousers — and four fights broke out. The duos of overtime cops raced to each one.
Sometimes, when numerous fights occur at once amid swarms of people, Przybylski said, he concentrates first on moving people along rather than making arrests. “We’re just trying to break it up up and control people” at the point, he said.
He and Van Nostrand broke up one fight; the participants moved west on Crown, and resumed fighting. The officers broke it up again.
Eventually the brawlers, and the cops, ended up in the parking lot at George and College across from Cooperative Arts & Humanities High School. Several groups of fighters had ended up there. A bunch of the officers were there, too.
Two main fighters were wrestling on the ground. Przybylski bent over them, pulling them apart. It was 2:06 a.m.
“Out of nowhere,” he recalled he “heard gunshots from close behind me.”
He turned around. Form the corner of his eye he saw a muzzle flash. A shot rang out, 15 feet behind him.
At that moment Przybylski stopped breaking up the fight. This was more serious.
The shots came from a blue Infinity G35X. Przybylski and the other officers headed toward the car. He pointed his gun.
“Let me see your hands!” he called out.
Two men were in the car. He ordered the passenger out. The passenger complied, got on the ground, showed his hands. Przybylski started handcuffing him.
The driver had one leg in the car; the door was open. Suddenly he bolted.
Other officers — Van Nostrand, Brendan Canning, David Totino, Jason Renckowicz — chased the 24-year-old driver through an alley, caught him, and arrested him.
Meanwhile, Przybylski checked the driver’s seat. He found an Accu-Tek .380 handgun. Nearby he found two shell casings and a live bullet.
After the gun fired, after the driver ran, when he later had time to relax and reflect, did Przybylski have one of those “I could have been killed!” moments?
“I can’t think like that,” he said. “It goes with the job. You can get shot any day.”
Besides, he said, in some ways Saturday night was “pretty standard.” Or at least in keeping with policing the bar district.
He was among the first cops arriving on scene three years ago at a homicide outside Gotham Citi. He saw the victim on the ground, called the ambulance, secured the scene, started talking to witnesses.
He was among the officers responding when a patron was stabbed to death on the dance floor inside the Lazy Lizard’s precursor club. He was one of the first on the scene at a May 18 fatal triple-shooting at College and Crown.
In between, he has learned to station himself either directly under the Crown Street Garage, or across the street, so he doesn’t get hit by bottles the departing bar patrons fling from above. He has grown accustomed to getting spit at, to hearing taunts from the young people he continually stops from fighting and sometimes has to arrest. Rarely do they reason with the officers, he said. “They’re so intoxicated, they don’t know what they’re doing.” Sometimes a college kid will regain some sense after being handcuffed. “They say, ‘I’m sorry. I’m a student. I’m going to school for criminal justice. I apologize.”
Przybylski, who grew up in Naugatuck, was once one of those students. He earned a joint criminal justice and business degree at University of New Haven before joining the New Haven force. He used to hit the Crown Street clubs in his college days.
“I’d go out and have a good time, and go home,” he recalled. “I never got into a confrontation there. I don’t know what goes through people’s heads.”
He has more success conversing with people in Newhallville on his regular beat. That’s the fun part of the job, he said. “I’ve been there so long, I know the people there. I’m comfortable. You see a little bit of everything there.” The Newhallville beat is a calling; the bar district is a job. He keeps taking the regular overtime gig there largely for the money. He earns it.
Read other installments in the Independent’s “Cop of the Week” series:
• Shafiq Abdussabur
• Craig Alston & Billy White Jr.
• James Baker
• Lloyd Barrett
• Manmeet Bhagtana (Colon)
• Paul Bicki
• Paul Bicki (2)
• Sheree Biros
• Bitang
• Scott Branfuhr
• Dennis Burgh
• Anthony Campbell
• Rob Clark & Joe Roberts
• Sydney Collier
• Carlos Conceicao
• Carlos Conceicao (2)
• Carlos Conceicao and Josh Kyle
• David Coppola
• Roy Davis
• Joe Dease
• Milton DeJesus
• Milton DeJesus (2)
• Brian Donnelly
• Anthony Duff
• Robert DuPont
• Jeremie Elliott and Scott Shumway
• Jose Escobar Sr.
• Bertram Ettienne
• Bertram Ettienne (2)
• Martin Feliciano & Lou DeCrescenzo
• Paul Finch
• Jeffrey Fletcher
• Renee Forte
• Marco Francia
• William Gargone
• William Gargone & Mike Torre
• Derek Gartner
• Derek Gartner & Ryan Macuirzynski
• Jon Haddad & Daniela Rodriguez
• Dan Hartnett
• Ray Hassett
• Robert Hayden
• Robin Higgins
• Ronnell Higgins
• William Hurley & Eddie Morrone
• Racheal Inconiglios
• Juan Ingles
• Paul Kenney
• Hilda Kilpatrick
• Herb Johnson
• John Kaczor & Alex Morgillo
• Jillian Knox
• Peter Krause
• Peter Krause (2)
• Amanda Leyda
• Rob Levy
• Anthony Maio
• Dana Martin
• Steve McMorris
• Juan Monzon
• Chris Perrone
• Ron Perry
• Joe Pettola
• Diego Quintero and Elvin Rivera
• Stephanie Redding
• Tony Reyes
• David Rivera
• Luis & David Rivera
• Luis Rivera (2)
• Salvador Rodriguez
• Salvador Rodriguez (2)
• Brett Runlett
• David Runlett
• Allen Smith
• Marcus Tavares
• Martin Tchakirides
• David Totino
• Stephan Torquati
• Gene Trotman Jr.
• Kelly Turner
• Lars Vallin (& Xander)
• Dave Vega & Rafael Ramirez
• Earl Reed
• John Velleca
• Manuella Vensel
• Holly Wasilewski
• Holly Wasilewski (2)
• Alan Wenk
• Stephanija VanWilgen
• Elizabeth White & Allyn Wright
• Matt Williams
• Michael Wuchek
• Michael Wuchek (2)
• David Zannelli
• David Zaweski