NYPD cop Patrick Prince dies in  after-shift crash in East Flatbush 

He wanted to be a cop since he was a kid, but an NYPD officer’s  dream-come-true ended Thursday before his rookie year was up.

Officer Patrick Prince, 22, died in a Brooklyn car cash while on his way  home after wrapping up his 7:30 p.m.-to-3:30 a.m. tour in the 73rd Precinct in  Brownsville.

“He was a good person, and a good son,” his heartbroken mother, Claudette  Prince, told the Daily News.

Scrolling through family photos on an iPad at her Flatbush home, her teary  eyes staring at photos of her son in his uniform.

“He always wanted to be one of the city’s Finest,” his mother said. “He took  the exam when he was 18, the first chance he got.” He had to wait until he was  21 before he could join the NYPD — which he finally did in July.

Demetrius Loadholt/New York Daily  News

The car first crashed into a tree on  a median between Tilden Ave. and Beverly Road, then smashed into a second tree  about 4:15 a.m. Thursday. The officer was said to have been assigned to a  Brooklyn precinct.

Prince was driving west on Kings Highway in East Flatbush when he lost  control of his car. Drifting off the road, the car slammed into a tree near  Beverly Rd. at 4:15 a.m., sources said.

First responders desperately tried to get the officer out of his mangled  vehicle, a witness said.

“They had to cut him out of the car,” said he man, who did not want his name  published. “It took about 10 minutes. It was bad.”

He was taken to Brookdale University Hospital, but could not be saved.

No one else was hurt in the accident.

Demetrius Loadholt/New York Daily  News

The officer was rushed to Brookdale  Hospital but could not be saved.

Hours after the crash, the pain of losing the young cop just as he was  realizing his life-long ambition spread throughout his family.

“He said he was going to make detective,” said Prince’s mother, confident he  would have reached the goal. “We were proud of him. My father was a police  officer. His father’s father was a police officer back in our country,” said the  mother, an immigrant of Guyana.

He graduated from Kingsborough Community College in 2010 with a degree in  criminal justice.

To put himself through college, he became a security guard, said his aunt,  Marilyn Prince.

Recalling the first time her nephew put on his security guard uniform, the  aunt said, “He said it just felt right.”