5 dead, including suspect, and 2 officers injured at Queens Stabbing

Four family members, including two children, were stabbed to death in a Queens home early Sunday morning, police said. The suspect also set a fire in the house and then stabbed two police officers who arrived on the scene before one of them shot him dead, law enforcement officials said.

The police received an emergency call around 5:10 am by a young woman who said her cousin killed her relatives, the Department head Jeffrey Maddrey said this at a press conference on Sunday morning.

Two officers who responded to the location, on Beach 22nd Street in the Far Rockaway neighborhood, saw a man leaving with luggage, Chief Maddrey said. When they stopped him, the man stabbed one officer in the head and the other in the neck with a steak knife before one of the officers shot him.

The suspect was taken to a hospital, where he was pronounced dead. The officers’ wounds were not life-threatening, Chief Maddrey said at the news conference, which took place outside Jamaica Hospital Medical Center, where they were being treated.

When other officers arrived, they found an 11-year-old girl lying in front of the home and she was pronounced dead, Chief Maddrey said. The house was set on fire and the officers were only able to enter the house after the fire brigade had extinguished the fire. They found three more victims in two bedrooms at the back of the house: a 12-year-old boy, a 44-year-old woman and a man in his 30s, all of whom they believed had been stabbed to death, he said.

Officers also found a 61-year-old woman suffering from multiple stab wounds and taken to Mount Sinai Hospital.

It is unclear whether the same knife was used on all victims.

Joseph Kenny, chief of detectives for the department, identified the suspect as Courtney Gordon, 38, who police said was a Bronx resident visiting relatives in Queens.

Police said Sunday that the motive for the attack was under investigation and the 911 caller was being questioned.