gang member stabbed a city officer who tried to keep him and about a dozen others from killing a man early this morning, police said.Police said this began with a battle between two of the city's Latino gangs. They've made two arrests. This is what they said happened:Officer Richard Hammer was patrolling Mill Street by himself at about 1:45 a.m. when he saw a lone man sprint across the street followed by the group. The men caught the man and beat him, stomped on his head and stabbed him. Hammer jumped out of his car, yelling at the men to stop and calling on the radio for backup. When he grabbed two of the men, the others turned on him.Someone hit him in the back of the head. Hammer lost his grip on the two, and everyone except the beaten man ran north on Mill Street. Hammer got up, chased and caught the two he'd had before. As he pinned them against a wall, five or six others punched him in the back of the head and upper body. One of the men Hammer held turned, punched him and tried to pull him to the ground. They fought as the second man wrenched free from Hammer and ran with the rest of the group.Hammer cuffed the man he still held and waited for backup.Officers arrived and went looking for the other men. The man originally targeted by the group lay bleeding. He'd been stabbed multiple times and, police would later learn, was bleeding into his lung.Hammer noticed his leg hurt after he loaded the suspect into a patrol car. He lifted his right pant leg. Blood covered his calf and boot. He'd been stabbed in the thigh. Officers had already called an ambulance to take the wounded man to the Newburgh campus of St. Luke's Cornwall Hospital. Now, Officer Tom Reynolds loaded Hammer into a patrol car and raced him to the hospital, too. Emergency room staffers stapled the wound together. He is recovering at home today. The other man went to Westchester Medical Center. His condition wasn't available.

Detectives Joseph Cortez and Lorenzo D'Angelico arrived at the scene and found a pen knife with a long, serrated blade they think stabbed Hammer and the other man. Meanwhile, officers Anthony Giudice and John Maguire spotted a man on William Street who fit the description of one of the suspects. They stopped him. He had a knife and 1.8 grams of cocaine, and they arrested him on drug charges. They're still trying to figure out his role in the fight.In the hours that followed the fight, detectives began trying to put the pieces together. Detectives Cortez and D'Angelico questioned the suspect Hammer arrested. His name is Edson Godinez, a 17-year-old who lives a couple blocks away from the fight. They said he admitted stabbing the other man and Hammer. The second man arrested was 20-year-old Emmanuel Flores of Newburgh. Police say they're gang members but declined to say which gang. They think the fight was part of an ongoing battle between the Benkard Barrio Kings and La Eme, sometimes called Mexican Mafia. The group and the lone man are gang rivals, police said.
Detectives hope to identify more suspects and make more arrests in the days ahead.