Horror in a Hospital: Shots, Screams, Death : Killings: Authorities piece together the story of a distraught man’s attack at Mission Bay Memorial.

Gun drawn, the man entered Mission Bay Memorial Hospital, walked 15 steps down a corridor to the small emergency room and confronted two nurses seated at a long, white desk.

The man spoke twice. “You killed my father!” he screamed, then asked, “Who’s the physician on duty?” Up came the .22-caliber handgun.

The emergency room, with fewer than a dozen staff members and only two patients and their families inside, erupted in gunfire, chaos, screams and blood. Two were killed; two were injured.

An hour after the shootings Saturday afternoon, Bradford Warren Powers Jr., 46, of La Jolla surrendered to police. Booked on suspicion of two counts of murder and two counts of assault, Powers, described by a neighbor as having experienced “emotional difficulties” in the past, is being held in San Diego County Jail. He is expected to be arraigned Tuesday.

Authorities allege that he embarked on the murderous rampage at Mission Bay Memorial in reaction to the death hours earlier in the hospital emergency room of his father, Brad Powers Sr., a well-known architectural illustrator. The younger Powers was there when his father died during an operation and, according to police, returned to the emergency room eight hours later, about 4:45 p.m. Saturday.

Based on interviews with police and witnesses, including one of the wounded, the following sequence of events then unfolded:

Ten-year emergency room nurse Deborah Kay Burke, 36, soon to leave on a European vacation, was one of the two nurses the gunman initially encountered. She tried to scramble under her chair, but was shot once in the chest. Bleeding and confused, she ran outside and pleaded with occupants of a car in the parking lot to drive her to another hospital. The people in the car, confused and frightened themselves, pointed back at Mission Bay Memorial.

Burke fled around the side of the hospital and ran back inside. She tried to grab a telephone but collapsed on the floor. She died of her wound about two hours later.

Edward Thomas Rooney, 30, a student observer working his first day at the hospital as an emergency medical technician, was confronted by the gunman and shot twice as he and Dr. Michael Hughes treated an elderly woman in the middle bed of the hospital’s three-bed emergency room. Rooney fell to the floor after suffering his first wound, only to have the gunman walk up, stand over him and shoot him again, police said. He was pronounced dead at the scene.

Hughes, 48, was wounded five times in the abdomen and thigh. Meanwhile, two nurses frantically herded a 2-year-old patient and her mother into a nearby bathroom, where they locked the door and prayed the gunman wouldn’t find them. The little girl’s father, Fred Mowrer, a 38-year-old attorney from Albuquerque vacationing with his family in San Diego, tried to help the wounded, then realized the gunman was aiming at him.

Mowrer turned and ran. He was wounded in the buttocks.

“He didn’t look like a crazy man,” Mowrer said Sunday from his hotel room. He had been treated for his wound at Mission Bay Saturday night.

Mowrer, in describing the shooting scene, recalled most of all the frightening sight of the handgun.

“I was looking at him and I saw the gun coming up,” Mowrer said.

“I turned to avoid him. I guess I thought I was giving him a smaller target. I didn’t even know I was shot. I fell to the ground. I had just seen him shoot the other guy (Rooney) on the ground and thought, ‘I am not going to let him do that to me.’ I got to the phone and dialed 911.”

When police arrived, they feared the gunman was still inside and the entire three-story hospital was searched. But the gunman apparently had departed after wounding Mowrer.

At 5:40 p.m. Saturday, about an hour after the killings began, Powers telephoned police from a pay phone in Oceanside, 40 miles north of the hospital. According to police, he said he wanted to surrender. Several police cars arrived within minutes and officers took him into custody.

According to neighbors, Powers lived with his parents on Castle Hills Drive, on the western slope of La Jolla’s Mt. Soledad. His two children--a son and a daughter--also lived there. Powers’ marital status could not be determined Sunday.

The green, ranch-style home was described by residents as “the envy of the neighborhood” for its ocean view, beautiful landscaping and front-yard pool.

Powers was devoted to his father, neighbors said.

“One of the nicest young men I’ve ever known,” said Fern Pinches, a neighbor who has been acquainted with the family for 28 years. “He’s never been anything but extremely polite.”

But she added: “I do know he’s had from time to time emotional difficulties.”

Another neighbor, who asked not to be identified, described another side of the younger Powers. “There were several family disturbances,” the neighbor said. “And I’ve seen a number of police vehicles at the house over the past five or six years.”

Police could not confirm Sunday whether they had ever been called to the family home.

Dr. Harry Henderson, chief of staff-elect at Mission Bay Memorial, said the elder Powers was a frequent patient in the emergency room. Henderson described the 75-year-old Powers as suffering from heart and lung problems.

Henderson said Powers came to the emergency room late Friday afternoon suffering shortness of breath. He was treated and released, but he returned by ambulance early Saturday with what had become severe abdominal pain. Doctors determined he was suffering from an abdominal aneurysm that was bursting and decided they had no choice but to operate, Henderson said.

Powers died on the operating table about 8:40 a.m.

His son and other family members, who had come to hospital, were notified. Henderson said the younger Powers, whom he described as “upset and angry” upon arriving at the hospital, did not seem overly distraught. “But he was also concerned that his father had died, and he was concerned that something was not done appropriately” by the emergency room staff, Henderson said.

Hospital officials said Sunday that every effort had been made to save the elder Powers’ life.

Burke, the Kansas-born nurse who was killed, was described as very popular among the hospital’s staff. She had wanted to donate a kidney to her ailing sister, friends said.

“If there’s a heaven, Debbie is there,” said one hospital volunteer, overcome with grief as he sat Sunday afternoon outside the hospital.

Rooney, the student trainee who hoped to become a paramedic, was engaged to be married in October, said Earl Parker, a friend.

“Ed was a great guy, a beautiful young man,” Parker said. “It’s just a tragedy. We’re all having a hard time believing it.”

Hughes was in good condition Sunday at Scripps Memorial Hospital. In a brief interview, he said: “I’m feeling better. I just don’t want to talk.”

The emergency room was scheduled to reopen this morning. On Sunday, baskets of flowers lined the nurses’ table. A sympathy card, written by hospital volunteer Betty Ditto, said:

“I give blessings for this Easter morning. But my heart aches for yesterday’s tragedy.”