A highly decorated undercover narcotics officer was shot in the left hand yesterday during a fierce struggle with a pot-smoker on Staten Island, authorities said.
Victor Villarreal, 36 -a 10-year veteran with a brother also on the force -was in surgery at St. Vincent’s Hospital on Staten Island to save his left finger damaged in the fight.
The bloodshed erupted at 5:23 p.m. at 1077 Castleton Ave. in the West Brighton Houses, police said.The housing project is the same place where Officer Gerard Carter was killed while on patrol in July 1998.
Sources said Villarreal and his partner, Michael Sullivan, were at the complex looking for a suspect.
Police Commissioner Bernard Kerik said the two plainclothes cops separated when Villarreal spotted a man smoking pot.
Villarreal confronted the smoker, touching off a struggle for Villarreal’s gun, Kerik said.
When the gun went off, it damaged Villarreal’s left index finger. The suspect, described as under 6-feet tall and wearing a red kerchief, fled.
Kerik and Mayor Giuliani rushed to the hospital to comfort the injured officer and his wife.
Villarreal was “in good spirits, [but] his hand has a pretty severe injury,” Kerik said.