Thousands of mourners — including police officers representing departments from across the nation — are expected to attend the funeral Mass on Friday at St. Patrick’s Cathedral in Manhattan for NYPD Officer Jason Rivera, who was fatally shot last week while responding to a mother-son dispute in a Harlem apartment.
Cardinal Timothy Dolan, the archbishop of New York, will preside over the funeral Mass for Rivera, 22, which begins at 9 a.m. The funeral will be followed by a private cremation ceremony at Ferncliff Cemetery in Westchester, according to the NYPD.
Dolan will also preside over the funeral Mass for Rivera’s colleague, NYPD Officer Wilbert Mora, 27, who died earlier this week from injuries he suffered in the same shooting.
Mora’s viewing service will be held at St. Patrick’s on Tuesday and his funeral is scheduled for Wednesday.
“The murders of officers Jason Rivera and Wilbert Mora leave us with broken hearts, flags at half staff and black bands on our shields,” NYPD Commissioner Keechant Sewell said on Twitter Wednesday. “They were great officers doing an important job — work their fellow Finest continue in their honor. Pray for them. Support them and #NeverForget.”
Fifth Avenue will be closed between 42nd Street and 51st Street before the funeral, which Mayor Eric Adams and Gov. Kathy Hochul are scheduled to attend,
Rivera and Mora, both Roman Catholics who lived in Manhattan, suffered fatal gunshot wounds on Jan. 21 while responding to a 911 call from a Harlem woman seeking help with her son, Lashawn McNeil, 41.
Police said McNeil opened fire after Rivera and Mora entered a bedroom at the rear of the apartment to speak to him. A third officer on the call then shot McNeil, who died from his wounds on Monday.
Rivera was married and the father of one.
NYPD Police Benevolent Associatin President Patrick Lynch has called on the public to attend Rivera’s funeral to show support for cops.
“The streets can’t just be full of New York City police officers at this funeral,” Lynch said last week. “The public has to come. The public has to send a message to anyone that dares to harm a New York City police officer. Not here, not now, not today, not to us.”
St. Patrick’s Cathedral has been the venue for hundreds of funeral Mases for police officers and other first responders, according to a spokesman for the archdiocese, although it is rare for the iconic church to host a wake.
Thousands of mourners lined up to pay their respects to Officers Wenjian Liu and Rafael Ramos, who were fatally shot in Bedford-Stuyvesant in 2014. In 2017, 12,000 officers and other mourners waited on mile-long lines to pay their respects to NYPD Det. Steven McDonald, who died 30 years after a gunman shot and paralyzed him in 1986.
With Matthew Chayes
