Family, friends, neighbors and colleagues gathered Thursday evening to remember NYPD Detective Brian Simonsen of Calverton in a candlelight prayer service at his gravesite in Jamesport Cemetery.
Simonsen, 42, who grew up in Jamesport, was a 19-year veteran of the New York City Police Department. He was mortally wounded in a shootout Feb. 12, 2019 when he responded to a call for an armed robbery in progress at a T-Mobile store in the Queens precinct he’d spent his career protecting.
He left behind his wife Leanne, his mother Linda and his grandfather Vernon Petersen.
Simonsen’s funeral last year drew thousands to the North Fork hamlet, where Main Road was lined with mourners as the funeral procession made its way to the Jamesport Cemetery, following a Mass at St. Rosalie’s Church in Hampton Bays.
The town board in April gave South Jamesport Avenue, the road Simonsen grew up on, the honorary designation “Det. Brian Simonsen Way.” The road was dedicated in his memory during a ceremony in June.
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