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Tuesday, December 13, 2011

Violent ex-con arrested for shooting NYPD cop dead was wanted for shooting in North Carolina in August

Officers salute as relatives of slain NYPD Officer Peter Figoski leave Jamaica Hospital in Queens.

The violent ex-con accused of gunning down a hero cop in Brooklyn Monday should have been locked up weeks ago for shooting a man in North Carolina, the Daily News has learned.

Despite being arrested twice in New York since September, a series of legal snafus allowed Lamont Pride to roam the streets of the city free to kill.

“I’m glad he’s finally caught. I wouldn’t put nothing past this guy,” RayShawn Maberson, the Greensboro, N.C., man Pride is accused of shooting in August, said when told Pride was arrested for killing veteran NYPD Officer Peter Figoski.

Maberson, 25, said he was shot Aug. 5 outside his apartment when Pride accused him of having sex with his girlfriend.

“He ran up and started talking jibber-jabberish about something one of his homeboys told him about me,” Maberson said.

He said he was bracing for a fist fight when Pride pulled a gun.

“He didn’t want to go one-on-one,” he said. “It’s just that a pistol is his weapon of choice.”

Maberson said he tried to go into his apartment, but Pride shot him in the foot and fled.

Greensboro cops quickly figured out Pride was the gunman and issued a felony warrant.

Feeling the heat, Pride — who was released from a North Carolina prison in October 2010 after serving 13 months for robbery — fled the Tar Heel State.

On Sept. 22, Pride, 27, resurfaced in Brooklyn, where he was arrested on misdemeanor charges for possessing a knife.

The NYPD noticed he had a felony warrant and contacted the North Carolina cops.

“They did call us in September,” said Greenboro Police spokeswoman Susan Danielsen. “But the warrants, unbeknownst to us, did not have extradition orders on them.”

Pride pleaded guilty to disorderly conduct a day after his arrest and was released on a sentence of time served — less than 24 hours. But he didn’t stay out of trouble for long.

He was busted with three other people Nov. 3 for drugs inside an apartment in the Marlboro Houses in Gravesend, where cops seized bags of crack cocaine and marijuana.

“We ran him and found he was wanted in [North Carolina\] on weapon assault charges, but the warrant specified ‘extradite within the State of North Carolina only,’ ” said NYPD spokesman Paul Browne.

The NYPD contacted North Carolina authorities twice to press them to change the warrant, but they refused, sources said.

At Pride’s Nov. 4 arraignment, prosecutor Evan Degrees asked bail be set at $2,500. But Brooklyn Criminal Court Judge Evelyn LaPorte released him on his own recognizance, records show.

“On Nov. 8 — after apparently reconsidering — North Carolina amended the warrant to allow for extradition from New York,” Browne said.

The NYPD Fugitive Task Force was sent to look for him.

“He was in the wind by then,” Browne said.

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