Duty Death: Kathleen O’Connor-Funigiello - [New Rochelle]
End of Service: 16/08/2018
By Police1 Staff
NEW ROCHELLE, NY — A 20-year veteran officer of the New Rochelle Police Department died Aug. 16 from cancer developed from assisting search and rescue efforts after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks.
Officer Katheleen O’Connor-Funigiello is survived by her husband, three step-children and five siblings, ODMP reports.
Seventy-two officers from eight local, state and federal agencies were killed on Sept. 11, 2001 when al Qaeda terrorists crashed four hijacked planes into the World Trade Center towers in New York City, the Pentagon in Arlington, Virginia and a field near Shanksville, Pennsylvania.
Heavy air contamination resulting from the attacks at Ground Zero led to the illness and deaths of several first responders in the years following the incident.
On Sept. 9, 2005, President George W. Bush awarded the 9/11 Heroes Medal of Valor posthumously to all public safety officers killed on Sept. 11, 2001.