Afterward the District Attorney’s office
conducted an investigation and eventually ruled that the shooting and actions by the officers were justified. News reports in- dicated that the suspect and the police had exchanged shots in nine separate locations. It was one of the biggest running shootouts between a suspect and police that San Diego had seen in several decades.
About the Author: Darryl Kimball, a sergeant and
helicopter pilot with the San Diego Sheriff’s Department, came to California from his hometown of
Oktaha, Oklahoma. His lifelong dream
just pulling up to the stop sign at the in- tersection, be careful. He’s right around the corner from you.” Both officers dove out of their patrol
cars and ran around behind them, taking up defensive positions with their cars as cover. Staying behind the wheel of a pa- trol car in a situation like this makes you a sitting duck. You don’t want to be there when the bad guy starts shooting. At this point the suspect wasn’t really try-
ing to get away. We’d find out later that he had meth in his system. That’s what meth does to you: it makes you do crazy things. The suspect drove right by the police
cars, shooting at them. The police officers returned fire. The Civic headed through the residential streets and eventually came out on Reo Drive, which runs north and south. The suspect drove the car up onto the center median and crashed into a stop sign, which got stuck under the front wheels of his car just as it reached the intersection. Several patrol cars drove up. The sus-
pect continued to shoot at the cops. Everything happened very quickly. I was still focused on the suspect vehicle. I don’t recall seeing any cops get out of
their cars. I just recall a lot of glass flying around, and knowing that the shootout was about to come to an end. A police vehicle came up on the right
side of the Civic—really, really close. The officer inside opened fire. He was able to shoot the suspect multiple times in the neck and head. A moment later all of the shooting stopped. I knew the guy was dead. You
rotorcraftpro.com 37
don’t take multiple rounds from multiple cops whom you’ve been shooting at for the last 15 minutes and survive. I had my binos up and examined the
suspect vehicle. “The suspect is motion- less,” I told everyone. The cops slowly approached the vehicle
and disarmed the suspect. He was dead. He had a loaded nine-millimeter Glock in his lap.
was to fly helicopters. After 15 years on the patrol beat, he joined the
department’s air unit, ASTREA (Aerial Support to Regional Enforcement Agencies) in 2005. Darryl runs the popular blog
policehelicopterpilot.com
and is the author of the new book Catch the Sky: The Adventures and
Misadventures of a Police Helicopter Pilot, available at
Amazon.com and
BarnesandNoble.com.
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