Coney Island fatal police shooting View Full Caption

CONEY ISLAND — An NYPD transit officer fatally shot a knife-wielding man who slashed the officer in the neck Thursday afternoon, Police Commissioner Bill Bratton said.

Officer Filippo Gugliara, 24, was on after-school patrol near Brighton Beach when he shot Oleg Tcherniak, 58, twice in the torso, killing him, at 1:18 p.m. after the Ukrainian immigrant pulled an 11-inch hunting knife and cut the officer in the shoulder and neck, Bratton said at a hospital press conference.

Gugliara was trying to arrest Tcherniak after seeing him knock a 78-year-old woman to the ground and punch her repeatedly, the police commissioner said.

The officer, who was not seriously injured, was standing on the elevated Ocean Parkway Q train platform when heard the altercation below.

The argument started in a nearby shop between Tcherniak and the store owner, but when the woman intervened he became violent, Bratton said.

Gugliara was attempting to arrest Tcherniak at Sea Breeze Avenue and West First Street when the man pulled the knife and slashed the officer across the neck, sources and witnesses said.

That's when Gugliara shot him, sources said.

Tcherniak was pronounced dead at the scene, an FDNY spokeswoman said.

The officer received several stitches but was not seriously injured. He's recuperating in the hospital with his sister and father by his side.

"He was brave," said Mayor Bill de Blasio, "He pursued this perp, he followed his training, he did the right thing. [He] went toward the danger."

Tcherniak had one sealed arrest for threatening to cut out a man's tongue, sources said.

Diana Khabenskay, 18, who lives in the building near where the shooting occurred, said she was returning home from school when she saw the officer struggling with the man.

"The police officer was trying to get the guy on the wall so he doesn't struggle, but the guy was struggling," she said. "He was trying to get the cop off him."

A video of the aftermath of the shooting posted online an hour later shows Tcherniak, heavyset man with salt and pepper hair, wearing a purple polo shirt and shorts, bloody and lying face down on the sidewalk. An 11-inch hunting knife can be seen by his right hand.

"I heard two gunshots. It echoed. I thought it was an accident," said Alan Vodovoz, 26, who works at a nearby restaurant.

~ there was shoottiingg on my blockck.. And i had my widnonsss opeenn.. Anddd i didnt hear anything ðŸ˜±ðŸ˜±ðŸ”«ðŸ”«ðŸ”«waaatt~ A photo posted by ~Nagima~ (@nnagima07) on Jun 18, 2015 at 10:33am PDT

Vodovoz said he saw a handful of other officers take the injured officer into an unmarked car on Brighton Beach Avenue and then to medical crews when they arrived.

"I saw them dragging the officer into an ambulance. He was limping," the restaurant worker said.

Gugliara, who was born and raised in Brooklyn, received several stitches at Lutheran Hospital, where he was listed in stable condition, the commissioner said.

"The officer performed admirably," Bratton said at the press conference. "He faced, quite clearly, life-threatening situation."

Q trains in both directions were bypassing Ocean Parkway while police investigated the attack, according to the MTA.

#ServAdv: b/d #Q trains will bypass Ocean Pkwy due to NYPD activity. Allow additional travel time.

— NYCT Subway (@NYCTSubway) June 18, 2015

— With reporting by Murray Weiss, Nikhita Venugopal, Katie Honan and Aidan Gardiner