Officer killed during a routine traffic stop
YVETTE URREA
Staff Writer
OCEANSIDE ---- A rookie Oceanside police officer died Friday after a motorist shot him several times during a routine traffic stop, and then sped away in his patrol car.
The 27-year-old officer, whose name was not released, died Friday evening at Palomar Medical Center in Escondido, officials said during a press conference held late Friday at the scene of the shooting.
Meanwhile the suspect, identified as Adrian Camacho and described by police as a documented Oceanside gang member, surrendered peacefully after a four-hour standoff in an Oceanside neighborhood, where he barricaded himself inside the two-story home of his in-laws.
Witnesses told police they saw him jump the back fence of the home at 1334 Via Isidro and enter the home at 5:38 p.m. Police said they believe he forced entry into the home, which was unoccupied at the time.
Crisis negotiators surrounded the home and tried to make contact with Camacho using a bullhorn but got no response, officials said. Eventually, officers threw a phone into the home and had a "brief communication" with Camacho after which he surrendered, said police Capt. Dave Heering.
Camacho, who is in his 30s, suffered some injuries during the conflict, but Heering said they could not say how severe they were or how they occurred. He was hospitalized after he surrendered, Heering said.
Friday's shooting, Heering said, is the first fatal shooting of an on-duty officer in Oceanside since the 1800s. The slain officer had recently completed officer training and had only had his own patrol car for several months.
Police Chief Michael Poehlman, who had taken the day off to attend his son's graduation in northern California, was returning to the scene Friday night.
The incident began when the officer pulled Camacho over in what appeared to be a routine traffic stop about 5:10 p.m. in the parking lot of the Navy Federal Credit Union on Avenida de la Plata, police Sgt. Tom Bussey said.
Credit union employees called 911 to report an officer had been shot, police Capt. Reginald Grigsby said. Several Marine and Navy paramedics were at the scene and began administering first aid before Oceanside fire paramedics arrived, Grigsby said.
The credit union is across the street from La Petit Preschool and Childcare center. Immediately, the school was put in a lockdown mode and students who were in the back of the school were ushered inside, parent Ruth Robinson said.
Parent James Fikes arrived to pick up his 3-year-old son moments after the gunman sped off. "At first it looked like a fight because all I could see was this man rolling around on the ground and people trying to hold him still," Fikes said. "There was no cop car here and I didn't know it was an officer."
He said people were running out of the credit union trying to help the officer.
With that premise in mind.....The officer was married with a two month old baby.
He was shot after he pulled up behind the criminal and pinned him in the parking lot.
The suspect fired on him, hitting him in the neck.
The officer returned fire and hit the suspect in the foot.
Then the suspect approached the officer who was lying on the ground and shot him again.
As the suspect entered the neighborhood where he jumped from the squad car, a woman was leaving her home.
She saw what was happening, got into the abandoned squad car and got on the radio.
It was her real time account of what was happening that helped them find the guy quickly.
A lot of people think of gang members as teenagers ----it's amazing how these hispanic gang members are often well into their 30s and even 50s. Many have never been employed and can never hold down a job.