Former cops still reeling 7 years after Sean Bell horror

Former NYPD Officer Michael Oliver is grayer than he used to be, though it’s hard to tell if it’s from age or the fallout of the Sean Bell shooting.

Of the 50 shots fired by police at the unarmed groom-to-be and his pals in Queens on Nov. 25, 2006, Oliver fired 31, and even stopped to reload.

Like most of the officers involved in the shooting, Oliver left the NYPD with his pension intact and will collect $ 40,000 a year starting in 2014. But for the cops who gunned down the 23-year-old Bell hours before what was to be his wedding, life has hardly moved on.

Sean Bell and his fiancee Nicole planned to marry the day of the shooting.Photo: AP

“Seven years have gone by,” Oliver said from the lot of a New Jersey car dealership where he sells BMWs in a suit and tie. “I’m just doing my job.”

Bell was killed and his two friends wounded in the early morning outside a Jamaica strip club that had hosted his bachelor party.

Cops conducting a prostitution sting at Club Kalua saw a man in Bell’s party arguing with another man outside the place and believed they were retrieving a gun from their car.

Within seconds, a team of cops closed in on Bell’s Nissan Altima and fired 50 rounds at it, killing him and wounding his two pals, both also unarmed.

“It was just a tragic event,” former NYPD Lt. Gary Napoli, who was commanding the undercover team, told The Post. “It was just a combination of circumstances that led to the confrontation.”

The former vice-squad boss, now working a per-diem security job, said he tries not to reflect on the shooting.

“You have to move on,” said Napoli, who didn’t fire his gun that morning. “One incident could change the lives of so many people? It’s just a shame, and we all have to live with it.”

Napoli was forced into retirement and given a $ 75,000-a-year pension with an annual lump-sum supplement of $ 12,000.

“I miss the Police Department,” he said. “Obviously, you don’t want to leave under those circumstances, however I didn’t have a choice. Thankfully, I retired with a full pension. No wrongdoing. And that meant a great deal to my family.”

Two other cops were drummed out of the NYPD for their parts in the shooting and are trying to pick up the pieces.

Detective Gescard Isnora was the only officer involved who was terminated outright with no pension or benefits.

He was the first to shoot that morning, firing 11 times and starting a chain reaction that set off the 50-shot fusillade.

Isnora revealed little about what he’s doing these days, but sources said he works for the federal Drug Enforcement Agency as a civilian and has tentative plans to sue the NYPD over the pension he was denied.

“I’m just trying to get away from all this attention,” he said. “I can’t answer anything.”

Gescard Isnora was the only officer involved in the 2006 police shooting of Sean Bell to be booted from the force.Photo: Paul Martinka

Detective Marc Cooper, who fired five shots, refused to comment. He’s said to be raking in $ 55,000 a year and an annual $ 12,000 supplement.

Officer Michael Carey and Detective Paul Headley fired three rounds between them but were allowed to keep their jobs.

Additional reporting by Lorena Mongelli , Kevin Fasick and Leonard Greene

Yahoo Local News – New York Post

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