Shooting Suspect Drinks Caustic Fluid
An ex-bus driver charged in a May 1 shooting rampage that killed one person and wounded three others apparently tried to commit suicide in his cell, his attorney said.
Paul Bellazain, 48, who has pleaded innocent by reason of insanity, drank a caustic fluid in the San Mateo County Jail and was hospitalized with internal injuries.
“He drank some caustic cleaning solution that he somehow got hold of,” Richard Brown, Bellazain’s defense attorney, said Thursday. “We’d asked the court to put a suicide watch on him, but the sheriff’s office refused.”
Bellazain, who had been on disability leave from his job as a bus driver with the San Francisco Municipal Railway, is charged with wounding motorist James Neuman, 41, on Interstate 280, then shooting to death James Vazko, 43, a San Francisco Examiner copy editor. He also is charged with wounding Daly City Police Officers Ralph Warren, 58, and Gary Smith, 31, in a shoot-out before his capture.
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