A hero New Jersey cop who worked around the clock to help flood victims during Hurricane Floyd went home after the storm blew over and killed himself with his service revolver, his stunned colleagues said yesterday.
Cranford Police Lt. Russell Wilde, the son of Police Chief Harry Wilde, worked more than 36 hours straight, directing relief efforts in the small town hit hard by flooding from the massive storm, said Capt. Eric Mason.
Russell Wilde, 33, was “upbeat” when he finally got off work at 4 p.m. Saturday – and headed off with his wife, Tracy, to a wedding, Mason said.
They returned home late that night and – with their two children, Russell Jr., 7, and Hayden, 4, at a baby sitter’s – Wilde walked into a bedroom and shot himself once in the head with his .45-caliber pistol, police said.
His wife called police and Wilde was taken by helicopter to University Hospital in Newark, where he was pronounced dead.
Mason told The Post that Wilde worked almost without rest from Thursday through Saturday and the stress of his job may have led him to take his life.
“I’m sure sleep deprivation contributed to this tragedy,” Mason said.
“We were watching people lose their homes and their property, [working] over what amounted to a three-day period and without rest.
“In law enforcement, I think we tend to start a case or start a rescue effort and we just work and work until it’s done without really consciously considering the risk.”
The Cranford police have only 50 members and Mason said Wilde was well known in the town where he grew up.
“This is a tragedy for the community,” Mason said. “He was the future of this department.”
Mason said Wilde did not leave a note.
Wilde was in charge of cops who rescued residents from flooded houses and helped some 350 people to shelters.
“He was out there during those floods as the commander, but he wasn’t standing around giving orders, he was working also,” Mason said.
Mason said Wilde became a cop in 1985 and his brother Stephen is a detective on the force.
In 1987, he won a police medal of honor and a Carnegie Medal , an award given to people who risk their lives to saved others, for jumping into the surf on Long Beach Island and helping to rescue two girls who were being pulled out to sea in an undertow.
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(Different version by William Neuman in the metro edition on p.6)