Collura saw it, though.

"Oh, God!"

chapter continues

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Farrell had no idea what she reacting to. That's when I felt the concussion of the first shots."

Two bullets struck Collura.

Farrell watched as Collura collapsed on the ground.

"I just hit him in the back of the head as hard as I can, just to stun him to get myself some distance," Farrell recalled. "I was in the military so my first option was to try to find cover, but I'm in a field...there's none."

Farrell, the former Marine, saw Marti get to his feet. He remembers that there was something awkward, erratic but at the same time mechanical about his movements "It wasn't like he was scrambling all over the place," Farrell said. "He was just kind of standing there. I know he was stunned from me beating the hell out of him and pepper spraying him." Though it was a full moon, Farrell could not see the young killer's face. But he could read the young man's cold intentions. Marti had meant to kill Collura, Farrell said, and now he meant to kill him.

"I'm ...keeping my eye on him...I'm trying to draw my gun. That's when he fires the third shot", Farrell said "...it hit my leg, right above the knee. It took me down. I mean that was one hell of a wallop."

Perhaps realizing instinctively that if he were down he was dead, Farrell struggled to his feet again. He has now idea how long he stood there before the second shot was fired. Two seconds? Three? Seconds last forever when you think they might be your last. As he wrestled with his holster, Marti fired again, striking the officer in the right hand, his gun hand.

It still amazes his colleagues that Farrell at last managed to pull out his Beretta and squeeze off the first two rounds. Marti flinched. But he didn't fall.

"I commanded him to get the f—k down," Farrell said. "Nuts. Screaming at him." But Marti just turned and moved toward Collura's police cruiser. If there is one thing that Farrell thinks he might have done differently that night, it is this: "I don't know why I didn't keep firing at him until he was down. I just kind of followed him and I realized that he was going to take Mary Ann's car. That's when I fired another round at him and he just dove into the car and took off."

According to police reports, as Marti sped off toward Paterson in the stolen police cruiser, he ran over the dead or dying officer. As he sped off, Farrell summoned whatever force was left in him. "I just laid off the other...12 rounds into the car."

He remembers taking a few halting steps toward Collura's body. Then at last, his strength gave out and he collapsed. A minute might have passed. Maybe two. At last a Fair Lawn police officer arrived. He rushed between the body of the slain officer and Farrell. Because Collura's police cruiser was gone, the Fair Lawn officer had no way of knowing that the dead officer was one of his colleagues, the one everybody in the department called "Ma."

"I think your partner's dead," the Fair Lawn cop told Farrell.

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