The E-Files: IF ANYONE ASKS, TELL THEM THEY WERE THE POLICE

As a child, I particularly enjoyed watching documentaries specifically on World Series winning teams of yesteryear, one of them being the juggernaut 1998 Yankees. As the documentary began, the narrator stated: “Tell them it wasn’t easy, teach them about our passion and our patience…and if you forget our names, just tell them we were Yankees.” 

Twenty three years after the terror attacks of September 11, 2001, it rings ever true on a grander scale for the first responders who, without hesitation, ran into the World Trade Center to evacuate innocent civilians trapped inside the burning towers. Firefighters, Federal Agents, Fire Patrol, EMS, and Police, from Court Officers to the Port Authority to the NYPD ran in without concern for their own safety. 

Among those running in against fate, and ultimately to their deaths, were 23 courageous NYPD officers. 23 men and women of different ages, backgrounds, and skills, some who knew each other. Bonded only by the patch they wore and allegiance to the city they’d all sworn to protect. 

Within that group of 23 officers of the NYPD, were 14 members of its Emergency Service Unit. The majority of you reading this know the names, and with the names the stories. A good portion of you not only knew, but worked with and loved on a deeply personal level these 14. Their stories interwoven within the fabric of a tragedy still felt, over two decades later. Tom Langone, who when not an E-Man in Queens’ Truck 10 was a firefighter out in the Roslyn section of Long Island. Wearing many hats, he served as its Chief, a fire instructor, FEMA task force member, and a loving husband and father to his son and daughter. 

Joe Vigiano, practically a modern day Superman. Shot three separate times in the line of duty, he came back to work each time, eventually joining the Emergency Service Unit because in his words when he was shot, “those were the guys that went and got the guy who did this to me”. Working in Brooklyn’s Truck 7 and later Harlem’s Truck 2, his accolades included the Lt. Mario Biaggi Award of Valor for an April 27, 2000 water rescue of an elderly man in the Central Park Reservoir off of West 89th Street, recognition for saving a construction worker trapped following a building collapse in August 1999 and the NYPD’s combat cross. 

John D’Allara was a gym teacher and bodybuilder before joining the police department. Ronny Kloepfer helped found the NYPD Lacrosse Team, Sergeant Mike Curtin was a Marine who’d fought in the Gulf War. His USMC and NYPD careers are highlighted in the National Museum of the Marine Corps.   

 

Sergeant John Coughlin helped deliver a baby and talk down a suicidal subject, Sergeant Rodney Gillis was an actor in his spare time, appearing on the NBC program Third Watch. Jerry Dominguez was a motorcycle highway cop who took on an even greater challenge when he became an ESU cop. 

Steve Driscoll worked in the elite Street Crime Unit before his 1996 transfer to Emergency. Wally Weaver was your classic animal lover, adopting a dog, Midnight, into the Bronx’s Truck 3. Vinny Danz was originally a housing cop who loved watching SpongeBob with his little daughters. Brian McDonnell was new to the unit, having arrived in the winter of 2000. He was a police officer in Arizona for a time before returning to New York in 1990. Santos Valentin loved his dog so much he’d leave Animal Planet on for him while he went to work. Paul Talty was working on his house in preparation for his third child. 

They were more than just the numbers they’ve become tragically synonymous with. 14 and 23. Husbands, wives, fathers, mothers, sons, daughters, brothers, and sisters. All that day with the same goal, saving lives. Rushing into the Trade Center that day, I’m sure the enormity of the situation crossed their minds. How could it not under such circumstances? With each step and each flight of stairs ascended, thoughts of their loved ones and fears of not going home to them very well may have crept in. It wasn’t just these 14 thinking it either. 

45-year old transit cop Ray Suarez had a wife and young daughter at home. His 26-year old partner Mark Ellis was a young promising cop who had applications in to both the Secret Service and the FBI. They both commandeered a taxi and raced down to the scene, entering the North Tower, never to return. Moira Smith had a 2-year old daughter, you remember her, photographed rushing an injured worker to safety, returning to the Towers moments later. Her and her partner Robert Fazio were among the first officers to respond, witnessing the first plane hit the Towers. Officer Fazio liked fixing cars in his spare time, something he was so good at, it probably was going to be his next career post retirement. You remember him too photographed aiding an injured man into an ambulance. 

Tim Roy was a Sergeant in the Transportation Division, he usually worked in Queens but that morning found himself in Brooklyn. He called his wife to say he’d be heading down to the scene. Jimmy Leahy, a 6th Precinct cop, knew tragedy from an early age. His father, a city parks security guard, was murdered in 1975 during a botched robbery, leaving a young Leahy to assume the role of man of the house. Glen Petit was an officer assigned to the department’s video unit who when not in uniform was a news cameraman, he was documenting the rescue efforts that morning when the collapses occurred, collapses he could sadly not outrun. 

Claude Daniel Richards from the Bomb Squad was looking towards retirement. A former Army Ranger and member of the Presidential Honor Guard, 2001 marked his 18th year on the job and 15th in the Bomb Squad. He was home in his Greenwich Village apartment when he learned of the attack, he left his detective shield atop his last will and testament before he walked out the door rushing down to assist his squad mates in rescue efforts. Officer John Perry was retiring that morning for crying out loud. He was a modern day renaissance man. A nine-year veteran, he spoke five languages and was learning a sixth. An actor who appeared as an extra in a number of shows and films and a law school graduate. Just about to hand in his shield to embark on his next pursuit of becoming a medical malpractice lawyer, he instead raced the few blocks to the Trade Center and was last seen carrying an injured woman to safety. 

They had their lives, their loves, and their dreams. Still, upward towards the danger they headed. Why? Because they knew there were others trapped in those towers with precisely the same fear and it was the mission to ensure the fears of those trapped civilians would not be realized. Thanks to what they and so many other responders did, those fears for 25,000 people would not be realized that morning and their lives went and are still going on. 

Did those 25,000 know these individuals personally? No. But on that morning as those workers raced down to safety, were they glad to see these men and women climbing those stairs? Absolutely. Perfect strangers responding to the most imperfect situation. The measure of a person is often how others speak of them. Do the good deeds far outweigh the bad? In the 23 years since these men and women laid down their lives, the measurement is clear. Their character, integrity, and selflessness living on. 

Will future generations know their names? They should. Familiarity with the stories are fading as those either too young or not even born when the day occurred get older, only knowing on a surface level the magnitude of what occurred. Heroism remembered is history preserved. History preserved is heroism honored. For those too young, they won’t know the names, they won’t know the stories, at least not yet, but should they ever ask, tell them they were the warriors, tell them they were courageous, tell them they were the police.