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In the Bronx, a tight-knit Bangladeshi community grieves one of its own
By
Arun Venugopal
Published Jul 29, 2025
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Arun Venugopal/Gothamist
By
Arun Venugopal
Published Jul 29, 2025
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Whenever Officer Didarul Islam had time off, he made it a point to visit the mosque around the corner in the Bronx's Parkchester neighborhood, said Malik Ahmed, the slain officer's friend and neighbor.
He remembered Islam as generous, with his wife regularly entertaining friends with chicken biryani dinners in their home.
Such memories have taken on new meaning for neighbors, family and friends in the wake of Islam's death. He was fatally shot by a gunman during a rush-hour siege on Monday in Midtown, while working a shift for a private security firm.
“Everybody's so quiet,” Ahmed said on Tuesday.
Police officials identified the shooter as Shane Tamura, 27, and said he took his own life after fatally shooting four others, including 36-year-old Islam, who leaves behind his pregnant wife and two sons. Another person was injured.
Malik Ahmed, a friend and neighbor of the slain NYPD police officer.
Arun Venugopal/Gothamist
Friends and others said in interviews that Islam, an immigrant from Bangladesh, also embodied a larger narrative: Bangladeshi New Yorkers who in recent years have joined the NYPD in substantial numbers, transforming their community and the department.
The Parkchester neighborhood has come to be known as “Little Bangladesh,” with the local Bangladeshi community growing from 1,900 in 2010 to 3,000 today, according to the Department of City Planning. Dozens of restaurants and clothing stores cater to the immigrant community, including one, Sylheti Sweets, that bears the imprint of Islam’s hometown, Sylhet.
Police Officer Didarul Islam
Photo by NYPD News X Account / Handout/Anadolu via Getty Images
Multiple NYPD officers stood vigil outside Islam's home on Tuesday while a police cruiser was parked nearby. Family members and friends came and went occasionally, and children peeked through windows at members of the press.
Outside P.S. 47, which faces Islam's home, a banner was strung that read, “The P.S. 47 family remembers our loving parent and NYPD Hero Didarul Islam.”
Anamul Haque, a friend and Parkchester resident who stood outside Islam's home, said Islam was deeply committed to the Bangladeshi community. This was often displayed in the time and money Islam gave to the nearby Bronx Islamic Cultural Center.
Outside the Bronx home of Police Officer Didarul Islam.
Arun Venugopal/Gothamist
Haque said Islam underwrote a meal for 100 people last Ramadan and donated $2,000 to $3,000 to the mosque. In a video Haque shared, Islam sat on the carpeted floor of the mosque, wearing a kufi cap and kurta, as the younger of his two sons, a preschooler, sat next to him.
“We are very sad,” Haque said. “We lost our brother.”
Islam’s death also surfaced a perhaps underappreciated fact. Thousands of Bangladeshi New Yorkers have joined the NYPD in recent years, according to Shamsul Haque, who co-founded a fraternal group, the Bangladeshi American Police Association, in 2015.
Shamsul Haque, who recently retired from the NYPD after more than 20 years, joined the department soon after the 9/11 attacks.
He said many did so to combat perceptions that “Muslims are terrorists, which is not the case,” and to help keep New York City safe. He is not related to Anamul Haque.
Shamsul Haque said the group had around 200 at its inception. In the following years, membership “skyrocketed” as members frequently did outreach within the community and persuaded others that, unlike police officers they may have encountered in Bangladesh, “we are not corrupt.”
A sign posted across the street from the Bronx home of Police Officer Didarul Islam.
Shamsul Haque himself rose through the ranks, becoming the NYPD's first Muslim and South Asian lieutenant commander, he said.
The Bangladeshi American Police Association now has approximately 2,400 members, he said, including 1,500 school and traffic agents and 900 police officers, detectives and senior officers.
Shamsul Haque said he didn’t know Islam but said he knew his reputation as “a person of faith” and a conscientious New Yorker.
“He believed that he always needed to do the right thing by the people,” he said.
Rubina Akter, who lives next door to the Islams, said she found “no sense” in the officer’s death.
She said she knew the officer as a “good neighbor.”
“He always says hello to us,” Akter said, while waiting for her son to emerge from the Islamic summer school around the corner, where Islam had taken his children.
Akter said she'd made repeated trips to the family’s home to grieve with them.
“ We just pray,” she said. “We pray for his family to feel better as soon as possible and his soul to [enter] paradise.”
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Arun Venugopal
Arun Venugopal is a senior reporter for the WNYC and Gothamist Race & Justice Unit who focuses on issues of race and bias in our region. His reporting also tackles the topics of immigration, faith, and inequality. Arun serves as the regular fill-in host of the station's "U.S. of Anxiety" program. Arun was the creator and host of Micropolis, a series about race and identity. He is a contributor to NPR's Morning Edition and All Things Considered. He has appeared on PBS Newshour, On the Media and Studio 360, and has been published in The Guardian, The Wall Street Journal and Salon. He also frequently serves as an emcee and moderator of panel discussions on race, religion, and identity issues and has been a guest host of NPR's "Fresh Air." He lives with his family in Queens.
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Gothamist is funded by sponsors and member donations
Gothamist is funded by sponsors and member donations
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