By Olivia Scheck
DNAinfo Reporter/Producer
HELL'S KITCHEN — A man tried to grab the gun out of a police officer's holster early Thursday morning, prompting a foot chase through Hell's Kitchen.
Two cops, a sergeant in plain clothes and an officer in uniform but wearing a regular jacket over it, walked into a deli at West 44th Street and Ninth Avenue at roughly 6 a.m. when one of them bumped into a man on his way out, sources said.
There was a brief tussle, and the officer believed the man reached for his gun, sources said. When the unidentified man realized he was tangling with cops, he ran off, police sources said, with the officer chasing after him.
"I saw the police officer run into the deli. [Then] he went down to the corner [of Ninth Avenue and West 44th Street] and started looking around," said doorman Jean Henry, 55, who happened to be outside his building at the time. "The way he was looking I knew something was wrong."
Soon a swarm of police cars were at the scene, Henry said. More than a dozen officers were still at the scene an hour later.
"[That officer] is a lucky guy," Henry remarked after the incident. "If he'd gotten that gun, he might have turned around and shot him."
