A retired NYPD narcotics detective who left the department 25 years ago after he was wounded in an off-duty shooting was charged with murder Wednesday in the shooting death of a Con Ed worker during a road rage clash on the George Washington Bridge, police officials said.
Victor Romero, 62, who retired from the NYPD in 2001, has been identified as the driver of a black Range Rover involved in the slaying on the New Jersey-bound upper level of the Hudson River span about 7:10 p.m. Tuesday, police said.
Cops charged Romero with murder, officials said. His arraignment in Manhattan Criminal Court was pending.
Romero joined the NYPD in 1994, officials said. He retired with a disability pension after he was shot in the wrist and chest during a shootout with three gunmen who tried to rob his family’s Brooklyn laundromat.
Hours after Koran Irvine was shot and killed on the George Washington Bridge, detectives linked the Range Rover, which surveillance cameras recorded at the scene, to Romero, who was taken in for questioning without incident.
Romero currently works in corporate security, where he’s assigned to protect and drive around executives, police sources said. The Range Rover was owned by his company.
NYPD detectives were able to get the Range Rover’s licence plate number with the help of surveillance cameras and area license plate readers and tracked it to Romero’s company. The company told police who was driving the vehicle, which was found parked outside Romero’s home in Haverstraw, N.Y., Wednesday morning, police sources told ABC Eyewitness News.
Detectives were at his home Wednesday evening waiting for a warrant to search both his home and the Range Rover. Investigators have also recovered the shooter’s weapon.
On June 25, 2000, Romero was off-duty and had just opened up King’s Laundromat on King’s Highway in East Flatbush when crooks burst in and demanded money around 7 a.m., the Daily News reported at the time.
Romero told them he would hand over the cash and begged them not to shoot anyone, but one of the robbers held a gun to a customer’s cheek, prompting Romero to pull his service weapon and fire eight times.
The crooks shot back. One bullet hit Romero in the wrist and ricocheted, hitting him in the chest. The chest wound was reportedly not serious, but his wrist required reconstructive surgery.
After the shooting, Romero and another employee immediately called 911. ”I’m off duty,” witnesses heard Romero say, according to a report in The New York Times. ”I shot two of them. Help. I’m about to pass out.”
Two of the robbers were each shot in the leg and arrested, while the third got away, according to The News.
Romero had recently celebrated his 11th wedding anniversary at the time of the 2000 shooting, according to reports. He retired from the NYPD with a 3/4 disability pension the following year, a police source said.
Irvine was on his way home from work in his dark blue Volkswagen hatchback when Romero shot him on the Manhattan side of the bridge on the W. 179th St. entrance ramp, officials said. Cops suspect road rage was the motive.
“That’s good to hear,” the victim’s cousin’s 38-year-old husband, who lives in Canarsie, Brooklyn, and declined to give his name, said about the arrest. “We have some family who is law enforcement. They said it’s a high-profile case for them. So they were on it and they had footage of the car.”
“I mean we live in New York, right?” he added. “So there’s cameras everywhere, so it’s difficult to get away with anything.”
Koran Irvine (pictured) was fatally shot in his dark blue Volkswagen hatchback by a fellow driver during a road rage clash on the New Jersey-bound upper level of the George Washington Bridge on Tuesday, Oct. 20, 2026. (Facebook)
Irvine was shot in the shoulder and the bullet travelled to his head, police said, but he managed to continue onto the bridge before crashing in the middle of the span. A bullet hole was found in the rear windshield, police sources said.
The killer sped off.
Koran Irvine (inset) was fatally shot in his dark blue Volkswagen hatchback by a fellow driver during a road rage clash on the New Jersey-bound upper level of the George Washington Bridge on Tuesday, Oct. 20, 2026. (Kerry Burke / New York Daily News; Facebook)
Medics rushed Irvine to Englewood Medical Center in New Jersey, where he died. A longtime resident of Flatbush, Brooklyn, he and his family had recently moved to Valley Cottage in Rockland County, N.Y.