Officer Shoots Woman Holding Unloaded Gun

A Hollywood woman with a pistol in hand was shot by a plainclothes Los Angeles police officer when she opened her apartment door after apparently hearing the voices of several officers in the hallway, police said Friday.

Police later discovered that the pistol was unloaded.

Nona Bowers, 21, who surprised the officers as they searched for a suspected kidnaper in the neighborhood, was shot once in the abdomen. She was listed in stable condition after surgery Friday at Hollywood Presbyterian Medical Center.

Three plainclothes narcotics officers, who received information that the suspected kidnaper was in the area, entered the building in the 1900 block of Argyle Avenue Thursday afternoon to determine whether the suspect was among a small group of people having a barbecue in the building’s front yard, said Lt. Charles A. Higbie, who is in charge of the Police Department’s investigations of officer-involved shootings.

Apparently after hearing the officers conversing in the hallway, Bowers armed herself before opening the door, Higbie said.

“She’s got a gun,” yelled Officer Wallace A. Carr, 32, an 11-year veteran of the department, when he first saw the woman standing in her doorway with the gun pointing down, Higbie said.

Then, Officer Stephen W. Polak, 36, who has been with the department for five years, took out his revolver with one hand while displaying his police badge with the other and shouted, “Police. Drop it,” Higbie said. Polak fired two rounds at the woman when she started to raise her gun in his direction, Higbie said.