Car-Theft Suspect Is Wounded; 2 Arrested : Investigation: Police seek third person and a woman who may have been briefly kidnaped.

Three gun-wielding males who commandeered a car from a man as he dropped off a woman at an apartment building early Wednesday were later confronted by police, who shot and wounded one of them.

Police said the woman, who remained in the car as it was stolen but who fled before police stopped it, may have been kidnaped or may have been involved in the theft.

The series of events began at 3:20 a.m. as Daniel Zavala, 24, and the woman, identified only as Crystal, sat together in the parked car outside the Imperial Apartments at 1722 N. Bush St., police said. Zavala was dropping the woman off after a date, he told police.

But before she got out of the car, three males approached and ordered Zavala out, Lt. Robert Helton said. They stole an undetermined amount of cash from Zavala, then drove off in the car, Helton said.

Zavala called police, who spotted the car about an hour later being driven north on the Santa Ana Freeway, Helton said. The driver exited at Main Street and stopped in the 100 block of Buffalo Avenue as a police car followed, Helton said. The three jumped from the car and began running.

One of them escaped, running between homes and businesses, Helton said. The other two obeyed officers’ orders to stop.

The two raised their hands in a sign of surrender, but one of them then dropped his hands to his waistband, and officers heard the sound of a shot, Helton said.

The two officers thought the suspect was shooting, and they fired, hitting him once in the arm, Helton said. The two suspects then ran in different directions.

Officers arriving at the scene spotted the suspects and arrested them, Helton said. Police found a handgun on the roof of a business at 2103 N. Broadway, police said.

The wounded suspect, George Sanchez Aguilar, 18, of Garden Grove, was taken to St. Joseph Hospital in Orange for treatment, police said. The other suspect, a 17-year-old, was taken to Orange County Juvenile Hall in Orange. The third person remains at large.

Investigators also searched for the woman, described as in her 20s, 5 feet 6, weighing about 110 pounds and with sandy blond hair. She wore black shorts and a black blouse, police said.

“We’re not ruling kidnaping out,” Helton said. “It’s a gray area right now. We really don’t know.”

Helton said county forensics investigators will conduct tests to determine whether Aguilar used the weapon. Officers found no shells at the scene, Helton said.

The district attorney’s office will investigate the shooting, as is usual for all shootings involving police officers.