Gunman Kills Bike Rider, Wounds Officers, Motorist

A gunman went on a wild shooting rampage early Tuesday, ambushing and killing a bicycle rider, wounding two police officers in a sidewalk gun battle and critically wounding a man driving on the freeway, authorities said.

The suspect, identified as Paul Bellazain, 46, of Daly City, fled on foot after he was wounded in the thigh during a shoot-out with officers near the crowded Westlake Mall in Daly City, just south of San Francisco, said Daly City Police Detective Jim McHenry.

An officer, who was shot in the left arm during the struggle, tackled Bellazain, ending a 45-minute rampage during which the gunman cruised Interstate 280 in a brown Cadillac, firing at cars and later took a chiropractor and his receptionist hostage, police said.

“He had three guns when he came in and he said he was sorry he didn’t have an Uzi,” the shaken chiropractor, Gene Martin, said later. “I thought I was going to die, but he was really after the cops.”

The shooting apparently began shortly before 9 a.m. in San Francisco, and within 15 minutes, police received a call that the unidentified bike rider had been shot to death at John McLaren Park, on the border with Daly City.

Bellazain, a San Francisco Municipal Railway driver and former president of a Transport Workers Union local, was in fair condition at a South San Francisco hospital, a spokeswoman said.

One victim, James Newman, 41, was in serious condition at San Francisco General Hospital with a bullet lodged in the right side of his chest, hospital officials said.

Two Daly City police officers who were not identified were hospitalized with gunshot wounds to the arm. One was in excellent condition, and the other was in stable condition, authorities said.

Bellazain’s daughter, Shari, had lost a kidney after being wounded in a drive-by shooting outside a San Mateo roller rink two years ago, Bellazain’s co-workers at the municipal railway said.

Two of Bellazain’s daughters, worried about their father’s behavior, sought counseling at Seton Medical Center on Tuesday morning, said Deborah Stebbins, a hospital vice president. The daughters feared “he was potentially behaving in a way that he might be of harm to himself,” Stebbins said.

Bellazain will be booked for investigation of two counts of attempted murder in connection with the shootings of the police officers, Daly City police said. And he is under investigation in connection with the slaying and shootings in San Francisco, police there said.