While on patrol in Harlem in 1972, he came upon a man suspected in an armed robbery. The man turned around, extended his arm and silver flashed from his palm. Fred Loehmann cocked his service weapon, but held his fire.

“I just felt like he wasn’t going to shoot me,” Loehmann said. “If it would have been a real gun, I’d be dead.”

The gun turned out to be a Derringer cigarette lighter, fashioned to look like a handgun.