NORTH HOLLYWOOD : Doctor Who Was Shot to Return Home

The doctor who was shot outside his North Hollywood home in an apparent robbery attempt said Friday that he expects to return home today.

“I think I’m in pretty good condition, all things considered,” Paul Hackmeyer, 41, said from his hospital bed at Holy Cross Medical Center in Mission Hills.

Hackmeyer was shot Sunday morning just minutes after he returned home from helping deliver a baby boy.

“I wish all I’d have to do is move from Addison Street, move from North Hollywood, move from California, but I don’t think life is that simple,” he said. “I’m more saddened by the whole thing . . . It saddens me that society has deteriorated to such an extent that someone would try to take my life.”

Well-wishers have sent hundreds of cards, calls and bouquets to Hackmeyer, who is clinical chief of obstetrics at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center.

The doctor’s colleagues have created two funds to help his family cope with financial hardships since the Jan. 17 earthquake left the Hackmeyers’ house in Sherman Oaks with considerable damage.

The Hackmeyers are living in a rented North Hollywood house until repairs are finished on their residence.

Hackmeyer said he had just pulled into his driveway early Sunday morning and was locking the gate in front of his house when he noticed two men. He heard someone shout, “Don’t run!” before he was shot three times in his arm, leg and back.

Police have no new leads in the case.