San Diego Mayor Aids Ruse to Thwart Suicide

San Diego Mayor Maureen O’Connor’s black sweater helped save a man threatening to jump to his death when a police officer put the garment on and posed as a priest, officials said Wednesday.

In town to attend a mayoral conference on drugs, O’Connor had just completed a tour of police activity in Manhattan early Tuesday with Detective Brian Mulhearn when a call came over the police radio about a man who was dangling from the cables of the Brooklyn Bridge.

The mayor “wanted to observe first-hand” how police operated in such a case, so Mulhearn drove her to the bridge, he said Wednesday.

“The guy was dangling from the cables of the Brooklyn Bridge. He was in the middle over the water. He was getting tired,” said Mulhearn, who works as a liaison officer between the New York City Police Department and the office of Mayor Edward I. Koch.

When the man on the bridge asked for a priest, police feared they would be unable to get one to him in time.

Mayor Offers Sweater

As a last resort, they decided a police officer should pose as the requested clergyman, Mulhearn said.

They began searching for a priest-like black garb and O’Connor offered her sweater.

“Time was of the essence,” Mulhearn said. “It was a judgment decision that had to be made quickly. Normally we would get a priest.”

Police Officer Gary Lajoe put on the black sweater with a piece of white paper wrapped around his neck to represent a clergyman’s collar, according to a Brooklyn police report.

He then persuaded David Sanchez, 29, to give up his threat of jumping and climb down.

Sanchez, a resident of a shelter for homeless men, was taken to Woodhull Medical Center in Brooklyn, police said.

Back in San Diego, the mayor’s press secretary, Paul Downey, said: “I know the one thing she mentioned was how impressed she was with the sensitivity and the ingenuity the officer showed in talking the kid down.”