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The arrest of a retired NYPD detective for the deadly road-rage shooting of a father of two on the George Washington Bridge has shocked his neighbors, who saw him as a “great person” who “cared about the community.”
Victor Romero, 62, who allegedly shot dead Koran Irvine, 46, on the traffic-packed crossing Tuesday night, had retired from New York’s Finest 25 years ago after he was shot while off duty in 2000.
The retired cop, also a married dad, lived in a quiet townhouse community in Haverstraw in Rockland County where everyone who spoke to The Post painted him as an almost perfect neighbor.
“I was so surprised when I heard this. I thought it couldn’t be true. I said, ‘No, you’re confused, it’s not him,’” Paola Ventura, 26, said of shocking news of the arrest.
“I saw him on Monday and we talked about my dog. I had a problem with my car and he helped me. One day my dog ran out of the house and he helped me get him back. I’m in shock, really,” she added.
The community board president, Ann Tartaglione, said Romero lived with his wife and his daughter who is in college and also had a son who did not live with them. She said he “wanted to help the community” and even put up his own money for a recent tree removal project.
“He cared about the community,” Tartaglione said. “I’m shocked. I really am shocked. I feel bad for the family, both families.”
Another neighbor, Luis Polanco, said Romero was “never aggressive.”
“If he could do something for you, he would do it. I got into a car accident and he helped me with the paperwork and what I needed to do. He’s so friendly. I saw him Monday afternoon,” he said in Spanish through a translator.
“I never saw him angry. He’s a great person,” added local Juan Duran.
Koran Irvine, 46, was on his way home from an overtime shift with Con-Edison when Romero allegedly fired a single shot in a fit of rage which struck him right shoulder around 7:15 p.m. on the New Jersey-bound upper level of the crossing, according to cops and his family.
Irvine was rushed to Englewood Hospital where he was later pronounced dead.
Romero admitted to being the shooter to investigators and handed the gun to police, sources told The Post.
Romero had worked with Brooklyn North Narcotics before he retired in late July of 2001 — a result of an off-duty gun battle about a year earlier at his family’s dry cleaning business, King’s Laundromat on Kings Highway in East Flatbush, police sources said.