'Absolute Hero': Officer Fighting For Life After LI High-Speed Chase

BRENTWOOD, NY — Suffolk County Police Officer Brendon Gallagher is in "critical but stable condition," police told Patch on Tuesday. Gallagher was airlifted and hospitalized after a high-speed car chase and crash trapped him with a torn aorta and split abdomen.

In just three years on the force, Gallagher's been through a lot in the line of duty: In an amazing twist of fate, he underwent life-saving surgeries this week, performed by the same doctor who saved his life two years ago when he endured a brutal on-duty stabbing.

On Sunday evening around 6 p.m., Gallagher, who was recently assigned to SCPD's newly created Street Takeover Task Force, was at an unrelated traffic stop on the westbound Long Island Expressway near exit 55.

It was then that a 2021 Ford Mustang driven by Cody Fisher, 29, of Brentwood, drove by going 95 to 100 miles an hour ,"putting every motorist in harm's way," said Suffolk County Police Acting Commissioner Robert Waring during a press conference on Monday.

According to Waring, Gallagher got into his patrol vehicle, an SUV, and followed the Mustang while "attempting to blend in with westbound traffic." As Gallagher activated his lights and sirens, Fisher accelerated, causing the mustang to fishtail and hit the SUV.

Next, Waring said, Fisher attempted to change to the left lane and almost sideswiped another vehicle, before overcorrecting and sideswiping the driver's side of Gallagher's SUV.

Waring said that's when Gallagher's SUV flew off the road, struck a tree, and overturned; Fisher's Mustang hit a light post, and lives were changed forever.

"The damage to the police vehicle was so significant, it took our emergency services officers over 30 minutes to extricate him from the vehicle," Waring said.

While emergency teams worked to rescue Gallagher, off-duty Nassau County Officer Timothy Deegan happened to be passing by on his way to work.

Deegan stopped, pulled Fisher out of the Mustang and placed him in custody, Waring said. Police soon learned that Fisher was "under the influence of drugs" and on probation for a prior "road rage incident" in Queens that led to that led to a weapons charge and conviction, Waring said.

Fisher was transported to South Shore University Hospital for treatment of non-life-threatening injuries, police said. He was later released and charged with driving while ability impaired by drugs, second-degree assault, second-degree unlawful fleeing a police officer in a motor vehicle, and reckless driving, police said.

After EMS rescued Gallagher from the "tangled mess" his SUV became while "controlling his hemorrhaging," he was airlifted to Stony Brook University Hospital with injuries "so severe, they are typically considered not survivable," Waring said.

"The fact that he is still here with us is nothing short of a miracle," he added, and asked the public to "keep positive thoughts" for his recovery.

Upon arrival, Gallagher was under the car of doctor James Vosswinkel, SBUH's chief of Division of Trauma, Emergency Surgery, and Surgical Critical Care—the same surgeon who saved his life two years before after the brutal stabbing that nearly cost him his life.

"Right when he came in I was able to ascertain that he had a belly full of blood, he was bleeding internally," Vosswinkel said at the press conference. "We also saw—and this is something I've not seen in my entire 23-year career on someone who's lived — he split his entire abdominal wall open across his pelvis. Through the skin, through the muscle, it was completely lacerated open. It was a very, very dire time at that point."

Vosswinkel added that when Gallagher arrived at the hospital, he was in "bad shock" and "barely had a blood pressure."

Armed with a "miraculous team assembled very quickly," Vosswinkel jumped into action, giving Gallagher numerous blood transfusions. But just when they thought he was "somewhat stabilized," they "realized he ripped his aorta."

"For those who don't know," Vosswinkel explained, "That's the big blood vessel that comes out of your heart and supplies your entire body with blood."

"Brendon's alive by the grace of God," he added.

But, Vosswinkel explained, Gallagher isn't out of the woods yet. After a four-hour surgery and over "25 units of blood product," he was in ICU asleep on a ventilator, life support, and medication on Monday afternoon.

"We ask everybody for their prayers. The next 24 to 48 is very critical to see if this degree of trauma affects his lungs and the rest of his organs and if we're going to make it past that," Vosswinkel said.

While those prayers fuel Gallagher's second fight for his life, Long Island is honoring him as the dedicated officer that he is. Waring said that in his short time on the force, Gallagher has received eight awards, including two department recognitions, a Purple Heart Medal, a Combat Gold Medal, and Cop of the Year.

On Tuesday, Suffolk County District Ray Tierney lauded Gallagher's heroism and explained the need for a crackdown on street incidents such as the one that left his so badly injured.

The night before the crash, Gallagher had successfully found a street race involving two vehicles going over 100 miles per hour. He stopped them, arrested them, and seized the vehicles, Waring said.

"We have a family, a mother and a father, wondering if their son is going to make it," said PBA president Lou Civello. "This officer is an absolute hero, we are praying for his recovery."