Officers Recall the Moments They Fired

In dozens upon dozens of reports on file at the San Diego County district attorney’s office, local law enforcement officers describe in interviews with investigators the second-by-second thoughts that blazed through their minds as they unholstered their firearms, raised their guns and shot a variety of people in what they perceived as life-threatening situations.

Sometimes they were confronted by people pointing guns. Sometimes by those brandishing knives or throwing rocks. Sometimes by suspects roaring toward them in cars.

“I felt the car was going to run me over,” said George C. Kathan, a San Diego police officer who in February shot Jerry Dean Dromely in the right temple, causing him major brain damage. “I thought the guy was going to run me over. He knew who I was. He saw me standing there.”

El Cajon Police Officer James LeStage killed Timothy L. Bloodworth with four rounds from his 9-millimeter semiautomatic firearm, hitting him in the throat and left arm. The shooting occurred last July, when LeStage was bumped by Bloodworth’s fleeing car. LeStage thought the driver was grabbing for a weapon in his lap, when actually he was only holding his genitals.

“I was not sure who (he) was, what he was doing in the area, if there were other occupants in the vehicle or if he was armed,” the officer said.

But, LeStage added, “Drawing my side arm is something I do when I perceive a threat to myself or anyone else, more of an instinct rather than a conscious thought.”

Also in July, San Diego Police Officer Daniel Roman shot and killed Lawrence Miller in his Mira Mesa apartment, hitting him twice in the abdomen when the man with a knife and a meat cleaver continued to come at him and his partner down a flight of stairs.

“I’m sorry,” Roman told authorities. “He came toward me. He wanted to get one of us. He had it in his eyes.”

San Diego County sheriff’s Deputy Danny McGowan fatally shot Robert Dean Thompson in November. He shot him in the chest in a house in Vista, where he had barricaded himself from police, raised a gun and threatened to “shoot it out” with the cops. Later, authorities found a letter Thompson left for his widow, proclaiming: “I live by the sword and I will die by that same sword.”

“The first thing that flashed through my mind is he’s going to shoot me,” McGowan said. “I remember seeing those training tapes and how easy it is for someone to just take that gun . . . and boom, shoot you before you can react, and that was going through my head.”

Some officers expressed fear.

“It was dark and I was, I was scared,” said sheriff’s Deputy Edward C. Jackson, describing how he wounded an unarmed Sergio Castillo after a chase in North County in November, 1988. “I only, I reacted real fast and I started shooting.”

Other officers couldn’t remember exactly why they fired.

San Diego Police Officer Alan Alvarez wounded Michael Harris in a January, 1988, stolen-truck incident. “I don’t remember actually shooting him,” Alvarez said. “I just did it. I didn’t think about it. It just happened.”

Many officers came away emotionally distraught.

El Cajon Sgt. Larry Wood wounded parolee Randall Geiger when the officer’s gun discharged in a struggle in January, 1988. It was “like a dream almost to me,” he later told investigators.

Jamie Saunders, a witness, said “the cop’s hand was shaking.” Lisa Saunders, another witness, also remembered his reaction.

“He just stuttered,” she said. “He was saying, like, ‘I didn’t mean to,’ or ‘I didn’t want to.’ I was crying and hysterical, and I looked up and the officer was also crying.”