Police Slaying of Man Mars L.A. Marathon

Police shot and killed a man who grabbed for an officer’s gun Sunday just a few hundred yards from the finish line of the Los Angeles Marathon, only moments after the first of more than 19,000 runners completed the 26.2-mile race, authorities said.

The gunfire, which marred what had been a picture-perfect day for the seventh annual competition, erupted at 11:15 a.m. in a crowded “family reunion area” at Exposition Park, where hundreds were waiting for friends and relatives competing in the race.

It was the first violent death in the history of the event.

“For the last seven years in L.A. we’ve run this race through every neighborhood there is” without incident, said Bill Burke, president of the Los Angeles Marathon. “Obviously, it’s a tragedy that something like this happens.”

Los Angeles police and witnesses said the shooting victim, identified as Daryl Montgomery, 30, of Inglewood, attacked Officer Floro Pinzon, 36, jumping on his back. Another officer, Rafael Acosta, 27, joined the struggle, trying to subdue the attacker with a baton, witnesses said. Both officers were knocked to the ground, and Montgomery tried to grab one officer’s gun, police said.

One officer broke free, turned and fired, witnesses said. Police said each officer fired once, striking Montgomery in the chest.

Police Lt. William Hall said he did not know why the man attacked. “It was after the race, in an open exhibit area with about 70 people within range,” Hall said. The officers had to take care in firing because “not only were they in their own line of fire” but many others also were.

Two hours earlier, the race had begun as a celebration of physical fitness and commercial endorsements, with a team of Elvis impersonators running in white bell-bottoms and a wedding party joining some of the world’s best long-distance runners for a brisk jog through Chinatown, Hollywood and a host of ethnically varied neighborhoods.

The weather cooperated; expected rain showers never materialized, and the temperature was a pleasant 65 degrees.

John Treacy of Ireland won the men’s division, finishing first in 2 hours, 12 minutes and 29 seconds. In the women’s division, Madina Biktagirova of the new nation of Belarus in the former Soviet Union, established a course record for women--2 hours, 26 minutes and 23 seconds.

Treacy won $30,000 and Biktagirova won $65,000, earning more because of her record time. Each also will take home a luxury car and a gold watch.

Far behind the winners were Peter Elkin and Lorin Johnson, who ran 13 miles to be married at the race’s halfway point by a minister in jogging shoes. The couple had met while running in the 1990 marathon.

Under a temporary canopy at the corner of Hollywood Boulevard and Orange Drive, they vowed to love each other “in times of health and times of sports injury, in uphills and downhills.”

Minutes later, the couple stepped back into the race. The last 13 miles, they said, were the beginning of their honeymoon.

While the event was tinged with romance for the newlyweds, most of the 19,483 runners saw the marathon as a test of physical endurance, a chance to measure themselves against a grueling course.

Some had trained years for the event. For Demetrio Culajay, the race was a chance to fulfill a lifelong dream of qualifying for the Guatemalan Olympic team. To earn a trip to Barcelona this summer, he had to finish in less than 2 hours and 19 minutes.

“This is my first international competition and I am tremendously excited,” he said in Spanish. “All of the best runners from Guatemala are here.”

Culajay finished in 2 hours, 37 minutes and 4 seconds.

Others entered the race on a lark. Stedman Ng, 14, and his friends Kenji Mukai and Darrel De Vera had never run farther than 10 miles in their lives. Someone had dared them to run a marathon. So there they were at the starting line, wearing heavy, high-top basketball shoes and baggy shorts.

“They play good basketball,” said Marva Mills, the boys’ teacher at Maryknoll School in Little Tokyo. “We’ll see if they’ll be good runners.”

Mills crossed the finished line 6 hours and 3 minutes later, followed by Kenji and Darrel. Stedman dropped out after 10 miles.

It did not take many miles to sort out the serious runners from the wanna-bes or the less than fit.

Already at mile eight, a steady incline up Sunset Boulevard was proving a formidable challenge for 43-year-old Louie Macias. “How are you?” his wife, Eileen, called out as he labored up the hill. Macias raised his hand in a weak gesture that said, not very well at all.

“He doesn’t train at all and he just comes out and runs these marathons,” his wife said after he had passed.

To reach mile 21, the runners had to climb another low hill on Crenshaw Boulevard. The slight ascent was enough to slow a few runners to a crawl. Some grimaced in pain as they started hitting “the wall,” the mental and physical limit that is the bane of all long-distance runners and forces some to the wayside.

For Rod Shorey, a 25-year-old college student from Woodland Hills, blisters were making it hard to stand up, much less run. As he walked the course with bloody feet, he was looking down Crenshaw for a shuttle to pick him up and take him back to the starting line.

“I saw a shuttle at mile 10 but I was feeling fine then,” he said. “Now I don’t know if I can make it.”

Farther back, 78-year-old Lucy Adney had not hit the wall yet. She did not feel a thing, or so she said, striding toward the 18-mile mark. Adney, a Long Beach resident running her 18th marathon, stepped smartly along, not slowed by the crick in her back that made her upper body tilt forward at a sharp angle.

“I’m finishing this thing,” she said. “I just don’t care to stop.”

Adney was one of a dogged rear guard who kept running, walking or shuffling, long after the cheering stopped and city workers carted off the barriers marking the race route. The stragglers were forced off the streets and onto the sidewalks, where they had to wait for traffic lights.

“That damn street sweeper kept breathing down our necks,” said Cricki Morrissey, 44, a Silver Lake resident.

Near the end of the route, runner Jeff Padilla was doing his part to take the marathoners’ minds off their troubles. Padilla was one of five Elvis impersonators who jogged the distance in resplendent white, gold-trimmed suits with bell-bottom trousers.

The crowd chanted “Elvis! Elvis!” as they ran by. In case anybody did not get it, Padilla pushed a homemade rolling Elvis shrine mounted on a baby carriage, complete with a portrait of the pompadoured entertainer and a boombox that played Elvis hits.

“We’re just try to have fun and keep the people going,” said Padilla, a 42-year-old swimming pool builder from Orange.

Of course, the runners also received encouragement from the thousands of fans standing on the sidewalks and in buildings overlooking the route.

At the corner of Catalina and 8th streets, Emma Gonzales waved a Mexican flag and yelled in Spanish to the runners who wore Mexican flags. “My heart is still with my roots,” said Gonzales, a native of Monterrey, Mexico.

Although Gonzales cheered loudest for the Latino runners, she clapped and yelled for everyone else too. She loves the marathon because it represents friendship.

“People forget their hates for a day,” she said. “You can see out there people from all different countries, different backgrounds, different religions. This is a moment in which everyone shows their emotions.”

Times staff writers Howard Blume, Julie Cart and Mathis Chazanov contributed to this report.

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