Baby Is Shot by Officer Trying to Halt Gunman

A 10-month-old girl was shot in the thigh Wednesday by a stray bullet fired by an Anaheim police officer trying to stop a gunman from commandeering her mother’s car.

The child, Michelle Olmos of Anaheim, was in stable condition Wednesday night at UCI Medical Center in Orange and is expected to be released in a few days. Her father, Peter Olmos, said a bullet pierced the baby’s buttocks and came out her thigh.

The suspect, a transient whom police identified as Steven Paul Harston, 24, surrendered at the scene and was being held in Anaheim City Jail on $50,000 bail, according to Anaheim Police Lt. Marc Hedgpeth. Harston faces

charges of assault with a deadly weapon on a police officer and kidnaping.

Jody Olmos, in an interview Wednesday night near her daughter’s hospital room, said, “He got in the car, squeezed right in behind my driver’s seat, put a gun to my head and said, ‘Drive or I’ll shoot you.’ ”

The drama began at 10:16 a.m. when an officer flagged down Harston’s rented car for a routine traffic violation. Police said he fled, leading them on a seven-minute chase through downtown Anaheim.

When the car became snarled in traffic at La Palma Avenue and State College Boulevard, Harston jumped out and tried to commandeer a car driven by Olmos, 31, police and eyewitnesses said.

Jody Olmos said she tried to flee with her child, but the gunman said: “Leave her alone.”

By this time, police had surrounded the car. When Harston pointed his gun at a policeman, the unidentified officer fired through the rear window of the car, unaware that the baby was inside, Hedgpeth said.

Police Criticized

However, family members Wednesday criticized police handling of the incident.

“If it was a police bullet, there was no reason for shots to be fired,” said David Gregory, the baby’s uncle. “They had the car surrounded.”

“You can see the car seat from the rear, so they could have assumed there was a baby in the car,” Jody Olmos said.

But Hedgpeth said the officer had to fire to defend himself and thwart a kidnaping. The officer fired only after Harston ignored orders to surrender.

The Orange County district attorney’s office, which questioned Jody Olmos, was interviewing the officer. Hedgpeth described him only as “an experienced traffic officer.”

In the back seat of Harston’s car, police found two wigs, a 12-gauge automatic assault shotgun inside a battered guitar case and a semiautomatic handgun similar to the one police say Harston was carrying.

‘An Awesome Thing’

Hedgpeth said the assault gun is a type rarely seen.

“It’s a very awesome thing. . . . It looks like one of those Roaring ‘20s machine guns,” Hedgpeth said.

The car, a white Nissan, was not rented in Harston’s name. It was supposed to have been returned to John Wayne Airport on Sept. 3, Hedgpeth said.

Hedgpeth would not say whether Harston has a criminal record. However, the FBI has been called into the case, and authorities are investigating Harston’s background and what prompted him to flee.

An FBI spokesman in Los Angeles declined comment on any investigation.

When the suspect sped off, police cars, motorcycles and a helicopter joined in a three-mile chase that ended at La Palma Avenue and State College Boulevard.

Olmos was stopped at the intersection on her way home from the post office. She said she had strapped her daughter into the front passenger seat because the baby squirms out of her rear car seat.

Saw Gunman in Mirror

She said she heard the police sirens heading down La Palma Avenue but thought nothing of it because there is a hospital nearby. The car behind her suddenly bumped hers, and she looked in the rear view mirror, spotting what turned out to be the gunman.

Olmos said he opened her door and climbed in. She had locked the passenger door beside her baby, but not her own.

From the corner of her eye, Olmos saw the dark blue glint of a gun, she said.

When the gunman told her to drive, she was stunned. There was nowhere to go.

“I was the third car back” from the intersection, she said. “Why he didn’t get in the car in front is beyond me.”

Cindy Keller, who saw the incident from Conroy’s Florist shop on the corner, said she watched the gunman approach Olmos’ car.

“She wouldn’t go because of the baby,” Keller said. “That’s when the guy got into the back seat.”

Officer Fired

Then, Hedgpeth said, the suspect pointed his gun at the police officer, and the officer fired.

“I heard two shots, and the rear window shattered,” Olmos said.

She said she didn’t see the man point his gun at the police officer.

“I heard no boom inside my car. . . . He had the gun pointed at me, and he very well could have pointed at him,” she said.

Harston surrendered. While police pushed him to the ground and handcuffed him, Olmos snatched her child and ran into the florist shop.

“She was screaming, ‘Get him away from me!’ ” Keller said.

Only then did someone in the florist shop notice that the child had been shot.

“You could see on the back of (her) pants where the bullet went in,” Keller said. She said any bleeding was covered by the diaper.