Teen-Ager Kills Father, Officer and Himself : Violence: Rookie Christy Lynne Hamilton is second patrolwoman to be killed in the line of duty. Domestic argument over loud music led to the shootings.

A rookie Los Angeles police officer was fatally shot early Tuesday outside a Northridge home by a 17-year-old youth who had killed his father in a dispute over loud music, investigators said. The boy later apparently shot himself to death.

Officer Christy Lynne Hamilton, 45, who graduated from the Police Academy on Friday, died after she was shot once in the chest with an AR-15 military-style semiautomatic rifle as she and other officers responded to a report of gunfire at an Amestoy Avenue home.

Police said Steven R. Golly, a Vietnam veteran and gun collector, was gunned down by his son, Christopher, after the pair argued over turning down the youth’s stereo. When police arrived, Chris opened fire on them from his front lawn, hitting Hamilton, police said.

The youth retreated into the house, and several shots were heard. SWAT officers stormed the house after trying for several hours to telephone the youth. Inside, both Gollys were found dead, police said.

Hamilton, a mother of two, was the second female Los Angeles police officer to die in the line of duty, and the ninth officer to be killed in the Los Angeles area in the last year.

Upon her Police Academy graduation, Hamilton had received an award honoring Tina Kerbrat, the other LAPD female officer who was killed in the line of duty. Kerbrat, also a rookie, was killed three years ago when she and another officer tried to question two men drinking beer on a Sun Valley sidewalk.

Friends described Chris as a bright but troubled youth who was a daily abuser of methamphetamine, or speed. He was recently kicked out of a continuation school after being thrown out of Granada Hills High School. Friends said he used the drug at least once a day and that it often made him edgy.

Family tensions reached the breaking point early Tuesday when Steven Golly asked his son to turn down his stereo, police said.

Angered by the demand, Chris shot his father. After the shots, an unidentified woman also living in the house fled and called police from a neighbor’s home. She was accompanied by her son’s girlfriend.

Shortly after 1 a.m., six officers in three police cars from the Devonshire Division turned the corner at Septo Street and Amestoy Avenue, responding to a 911 report of gunfire, Lt. John Dunkin said. The woman flagged down the squad cars.

The first police car stopped directly in front of the Golly home, the second at Amestoy and Septo and the third several feet behind.

As the officers stepped out of their cars, Chris opened fire from his front lawn, which is on an embankment about 10 feet above the street. He was, according to police, using a rifle of the type usually referred to as the AR-15, a civilian version of the military’s standard M-16 rifle.

From Chris’ vantage point, the first police car was out of the line of fire, but the second two were easily visible, police said.

Dunkin said one round struck Hamilton, who was crouching behind the open door of the third squad car and wearing a protective vest. The bullet punctured the door and went through an arm opening in the vest and into her chest.

The gunfire also shattered windows in two police vehicles and left a dozen holes in the body panels, police said.

After Chris stopped shooting and retreated into the house, other officers discovered that Hamilton was not moving.

Two more squad cars arrived, and the fatally wounded Hamilton was rushed to Northridge Hospital Medical Center by ambulance. She was pronounced dead an hour later.

While officers were removing Hamilton, another five or six shots came from inside the home, apparently marking Chris’ suicide, Police Chief Willie L. Williams said at a news conference.

After trying without success to reach someone inside the house by telephone, SWAT team members tossed tear gas canisters into the home about 6 a.m. and then entered.

Inside, police found the body of Steven Golly in a back room used as a den. Chris’ body lay in a hallway leading to a bedroom.

A youth who described himself as Chris’ best friend said he was at the Golly house Monday night when father and son were arguing, and that the younger Golly was not under the influence of speed.

Matt Conner said Chris was angry and talked about getting back at or even killing his father, a wholesale electrical equipment supplier.

“I tried to talk him out of it,” Conner said as he awaited police questioning at the Devonshire station. “He said he wasn’t going to do it, to shoot his father. They were having problems.

“He just said he had had enough. He snapped, basically. . . . He and his dad argued a lot. He lost control. He was completely sober (Monday night). I was with him all night, till 10:30.”

Friends said that the older Golly was an avid gun collector, and that his son often bragged to his friends about his father’s weapons, although the youth was not believed to own any guns.

It was unclear Tuesday whether the AR-15 rifle Chris used was from that collection, and it was unclear what type of the weapon he used.

Some versions of this type of rifle, which is manufactured in several models by different companies--are legal in California and others are not. A 1989 state law outlawed the sale of AR-15s manufactured by Hartford, Conn.-based Colt Manufacturing Co. But the law allowed owners to keep the weapons if they legally acquired them before June 1, 1989, and registered them by Jan. 1, 1991.

Chris’ mother, Pam, died in 1990 while his parents were in the process of divorcing. “She was my darling daughter for 40-some odd years,” said her father, Ernest Reepmaker, who lives in Westlake Village.

“Five years ago they were the happiest family there could ever be,” he said.

But Reepmaker said his daughter developed a “cocaine problem” and died of an overdose after the Gollys had separated.

Morales said Chris had “really been on edge the last couple of weeks. He’s really been shaky.”

Morales said the boy was doted on, even spoiled, by his father. Steven Golly had bought his only son a used Camaro and a Chevy pickup truck, she said.

But Steven Golly had grown increasingly frustrated by his son’s behavior, Morales said. Besides his drug problem, Chris was a fan of so-called speed metal music, characterized by loud, grinding guitar riffs and fast-paced rhythms.

“His father reached a point of no return with Chris--he wanted to help him,” she said. “He wanted his son to become a decent person again. At that point, when Steve could take no more, I think Chris saw it as his father didn’t love him anymore.”

In the last two years, the younger Golly began dressing and acting the part of a tough kid--ditching school, neglecting his studies and using drugs, friends and neighbors said.

Two of Chris’ friends who stopped by the house Tuesday said the teen-ager was a daily drug user. He liked to drink beer and use pot, and, starting last summer, turned to methamphetamine, they said.

Hamilton, the daughter of a retired LAPD detective, started her police training eight months ago after working for 20 years as a North Hollywood nursery manager. She recently moved to a Thousand Oaks apartment after separating from her second husband, a firefighter.

At the hospital where Hamilton died, her father, Kenneth Brondell, spoke briefly to Chief Williams.

“You’ve lost a good one with Christy,” Brondell told the chief.

Contributing to this story were Times staff writers Miguel Bustillo, Jack Cheevers, Chip Johnson, Ann W. O’Neill and Mack Reed, and special correspondent Thom Mrozek.

Scenario of a Shooting

Rookie LAPD Officer Christy Lynn Hamilton was shot and killed early Tuesday while responding to a domestic dispute in Northridge. During the five-hour ordeal the suspect and his father were killed. According to police, Steve Golly was shot by his son during an argument. Christopher Golly then shot Hamilton and shot and killed himself.

Five people, including suspect and his father, lived at the house.

Suspect fires at officers from behind brick wall.

Suspect shot 12 to 15 bullets into police cars.

At least two rounds are shot into Hamilton’s car. One passes through driver’s door, fatally wounding her.

The chain of events as described by police:

1. Neighbors report hearing shots about 1 a.m.

2. Call comes into LAPD’s Devonshire Division at 1:18 a.m.

3. Three cars from Devonshire Division responding to radio call arrive at scene between 1:18 and 1:30 a.m.

4. Officers see woman on Amestoy Avenue walking toward them, waving her arms. Assuming house is mid-block, officers from first two cars leave their cars and approach her.

5. Christopher Golly fires shots from behind brick wall alongside house toward cars across the street.

6. Officer Hamilton, in third car, opens her door, gets out and crouches behind door. Bullet goes through door and enters her arm at edge of bulletproof vest.

7. Officers rush to aid Hamilton, realize she is badly wounded and move her to ambulance. She is rushed to Northridge Hospital Medical Center. She is pronounced dead an hour later.

8. Golly returns to house and as Hamilton is being moved, five or six more shots are heard from inside house.

9. Officers surround house and are unsuccessful at attempting to phone occupants.

10. SWAT team arrives.

11. Shortly before 6 a.m., team lobs tear-gas canisters into house. A few minutes later, team enters house and finds the bodies of Steven and Christopher Golly.

The Weapon

The weapon used in the killing of Hamilton is believed to have been an assault rifle similar to the Colt AR-15. Manufactured in various configurations by different companies, these weapons are civilian versions of the M-16, a popular assault rifle used by some U.S. military services.

* Weapon ban. The Colt version of the semiautomatic weapon was among a number of assault weapons banned by the state in 1989.

* Typical features: Most AR-15s have a .223-caliber round are are equipped with magazines capable of carrying between five and 20 rounds of ammunition.

* Collecting: The AR-15 has long been a favorite of collectors and gun enthusiasts since the M-16 was made popular in the Vietnam War.

Source: LAPD

Researched by JULIE SHEER, TREVOR JOHNSTON and JILL BETTNER / Los Angeles Times