Officer Wenjian Liu — even before he had a badge pinned to his chest — was kind to strangers simply because that’s what he thought he was supposed to do.
The Daily News got an exclusive look inside the Liu family home in Brooklyn on Wednesday, as the slain cop’s father recalled the kindness of his only child. The grieving dad’s voice quivered on the brink of tears, as he recounted cherished memories.
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“In Chinatown, (on) Bowery St., there was an elderly woman. At the time, (my son) was standing there talking to a friend,” said Liu’s father, Wei Tang Liu, 63. “He saw the elderly woman unable to walk across, so my son went to help her. He came back to his friend and his friend said, ‘Oh, how come you’re so nice?’ And he said, ‘I’m supposed to do this.’ “
It was one of many stories the proud father shared with Brooklyn Borough President Eric Adams, according to video obtained by The News. The elder Liu opened up with the help of a translator, his first public words since his son and Officer Rafael Ramos were killed in an ambush in December.
As a young cop, Officer Liu saw a man aimlessly driving around the neighborhood and stopped him in the street, his dad remembered fondly.
“What are you doing here going around?” he asked the man. “He said ‘I don’t know,’ ” recalled the father with his wife, Xiu Yan Li, at his side.
Instead of calling 911 or sending the stranger on his way, Liu took the man to a nearby McDonald’s, where he bought him a hamburger, then found out where the man lived and escorted him there.
That’s the kind of man Liu was, the father explained.
“My son is a very good boy,” he said. “Very respectful . . . always help people.”
Liu always wanted to be a cop, even when he was a teenager, his father said.
“Right after 9/11, he put his full energy into becoming a police officer to help people in the community,” his dad said, adding that throughout the grueling police exams and long shifts, Liu never forgot about his family.
“I used to work in a factory and he’d always call and say ‘Would you like me to stop by and help you there?’ “
“When (his mother and I) are sick, the first thing he does is to bring us to see a doctor,” he said.
Liu hailed from Guangzhou, China, and came to New York with his family in 1994 to seek the American Dream, his family said. He graduated from Lafayette High School in Brooklyn and attended Kingsborough Community College and the College of Staten Island, where he majored in accounting.
His wish to become a cop was realized in December 2007, when he graduated from the Police Academy after years of serving the community as an auxiliary cop for the 72nd Precinct in Brooklyn.
On Dec. 20 — nearly 20 years to the day after Liu moved to this country — crazed gunman Ismaaiyl Brinsley opened fire on a patrol car in Bedford-Stuyvesant, executing Liu, 32, and Ramos, 40, simply because they were cops. Brinsley, 28, ran to a nearby subway station and shot himself to death.
Liu and Pei Xia Chen had married just three months before the murder.
Borough President Adams joined Liu’s father and four relatives for a moment of prayer with Rabbi Abe Friedman, a police chaplain, before hearing stories about the young 84th Precinct cop, whose main assignment was protecting pedestrians on the Brooklyn Bridge, according to police sources.
Adams called the immigrant cop’s story a “Shakespearean tragedy.” He said Liu’s story not only resonates with New Yorkers, but with all of America.
“This is not just a paragraph on the history of law enforcement,” he said. “It was a love affair with a country and a job (that) turned into tragedy that this family will never overcome.”
“I told them they lost a son but they gained a son,” said Adams. “I’m going to be a part of this family and help them through these difficult times.”
As Adams visited, six of Liu’s relatives arrived from Guangzhou — traveling 8,000 miles to say goodbye to the fallen cop.
The family members were among a sea of mourners to visit Liu’s home, where blue ribbons were tied around trees, sign posts, and telephone poles up and down the block. And the family’s quaint front yard was covered with bouquets of flowers amid a hand-painted sky-blue sign reading “Gone but not forgotten.”
Other mourners included NYPD Transit Chief Joseph Fox, whom Adams hugged in a tender moment outside the Liu house.
The parents of Officer Russel Timoshenko — who was fatally shot while on duty in Brooklyn on July 9, 2007 — also showed up to lend their support to the grieving family.
“We had one son only, and they had only one child too,” Timoshenko’s mother, Tatyana, said. “Our hearts are broken. No matter what we’re going to say now, the pain is inside. We try to support them as much as we can because we know what they’re going through and what they’re going to go through.”
Liu will be mourned at a wake Saturday from 1 p.m. to 9 p.m. at the Aievoli Funeral Home in Dyker Heights, Brooklyn, before the funeral at the same location the next day.
White House spokesman Eric Schultz said FBI Director James Comey will attend the funeral.
Police officials, meanwhile, said cops are investigating more than 70 online threats against the NYPD since Liu and Ramos were killed. Sixteen people have been arrested. Patrol officers were warned by their superiors on Wednesday to be more vigilant.
With Alfred Ng
