3 Killed as LAPD Car Hits Truck : Crash: Officers reportedly were speeding to help fellow officer. Four people are injured.

A Los Angeles police car racing to the aid of other officers struck a pickup truck in San Pedro Monday night, killing two children and an adult and injuring at least four other people, authorities said.

Two officers in the police car were speeding through the intersection of 13th Street and Pacific Avenue on their way to help other officers trying to break up a domestic fight at Cabrillo Beach when they rammed the pickup, said Capt. Betty Kelepecz of the Los Angeles Police Department.

The truck rolled over after the 8:20 p.m. collision, scattering bodies on the street and in the doorway of a local photo shop. The police car had its emergency flashers and siren on at the time of the crash, Kelepecz said.

LAPD Cmdr. Tim McBride said he did not know how fast the squad car was traveling or whether it ran a traffic light at the intersection.

Kelepecz said the dead and injured, who were not immediately identified, apparently were members of the same family. Those killed were a 4-year-old boy, a 9-year-old boy and a 20-year-old man, she said.

The boys’ parents also were injured but were in good condition at Harbor-UCLA Medical Center. Two other passengers were injured, one of them critically. Kelepecz said a pedestrian also may have been hurt.

Kelepecz said that the two officers were taken to San Pedro Peninsula Hospital, but that she did not know the extent of their injuries.

The incident began when two other officers tried to intervene in a fight between a man and a woman at the beach, Kelepecz said. When the man began fighting with the officers, they radioed for assistance.

Two other officers responded to the help call, speeding south on Pacific Avenue. The squad car struck the pickup as it drove west on 13th Street, Kelepecz said. Three people were in the truck’s cab and four were riding in a homemade camper shell.

“We believe they were obeying traffic regulations,” she said. “However, witnesses said that upon approaching the intersection, they accelerated.”

The incident is under investigation by the Police Department’s special collision unit to determine if the officers who hit the truck were acting within department policy, authorities said.

Kelepecz said the man involved in the fight at the beach was booked for felony domestic battery.

* Times staff writer Nieson Himmel and correspondent James Benning contributed to this story.