Two Drivers Are Slain by Police in Separate Incidents

Los Angeles police shot and killed two criminal suspects in unrelated Wilmington and Chatsworth incidents Thursday, in both cases firing after the suspects allegedly began driving their vehicles toward officers who were on foot.

Both incidents occurred about 8 p.m., and marked the 14th and 15th times this year that suspects have been killed by on-duty Los Angeles Police Department officers. They were the 21st and 22nd incidents this year in which officers have fired their guns in the line of duty, the LAPD said.

The Wilmington shooting was particularly harrowing, involving a standoff between dozens of officers and a suspect and his girlfriend, whom police had trapped in a residential cul-de-sac. As residents watched, the suspect allegedly sped at officers and was killed in a barrage of gunfire. Nine officers fired their weapons, the LAPD said.

In addition to killing the driver, police shot his girlfriend, Kathy Romero, in the leg. She alleged that police opened fire without provocation, but her account appeared to be contradicted by witnesses.

Neither police nor the Los Angeles County coroner would identify the driver, but Romero identified him as Amos Bell, who she said was recently released from jail. She would not describe the charges on which he had been held.

Police described Bell as a gang member who was suspected of fleeing police after a hit-and-run accident with a patrol car Sunday. Those patrol officers had been responding to a report of a man brandishing a weapon, according to Sgt. John Pasquariello, an LAPD spokesman.

On Thursday evening, Harbor Division patrol officers and police from the CRASH anti-gang program saw the white minivan suspected in the hit-and-run, Pasquariello said. He said they followed the van and eventually tried to pull it over but the driver sped away, turning onto Baypoint Avenue where it forms a cul-de-sac south of Sandison Street in Wilmington.

The patrol cars blocked the street and ordered the driver to get out of the van, the spokesman said. When he refused, police shot out his side windows with shotguns loaded with beanbags “to get his attention,” Pasquariello said.

Police approached, opened the door and tried to pull the driver out, the sergeant said, but the driver sped backward, sweeping the officers back with the open door until he rammed another car and the police were knocked to the ground.

With residents gathering outside their houses, the driver sped up a driveway and crashed into a garage, then reversed and began speeding toward police officers who were on foot, Pasquariello said. The officers, “in fear for their safety,” opened fire, he said.

Several neighbors said they saw police drag Romero out of the van. A wild struggle ensued.

Romero said police beat her, but the residents said she appeared to be struggling with them.

“She was fighting with the police, and they were having a hard time getting her down,” said resident John McDonough.

Romero, 29, said she and Bell, 20, were followed into the cul-de-sac by police for no apparent reason, but feared that officers were after her because she knew incriminating details about a homicide in Harbor City last year. Because of that, she said, neither she nor Bell wanted to get out of the van.

“I told told him to get out, but he said, ‘Baby, I can’t,’ ” Romero recalled.

She and Bell raised their hands to show police that they were not armed, Romero said.

In Chatsworth, an undercover police surveillance operation and attempted capture of four suspected purse snatchers erupted into gunfire when the driver of the suspects’ car resisted arrest and began ramming a police car, injuring an officer who had fallen to the ground nearby, police said.

To protect the officer on the ground, another officer fired two rounds at the driver, police said. The driver, who has not yet been identified, was pronounced dead at the scene by paramedics.

The other three suspects--Michael Allen Soto, 20, of Chatsworth; Derrick Waddell, 18, of Chatsworth; and Leonard Cornish, 19, of Canoga Park--were arrested without incident, according to the LAPD.

Officer Michael Amado, 29, who fell to the ground, was released from the hospital Friday, said Det. Roseanne Parino of the Robbery-Homicide Division. “He’s sedated and hasn’t been interviewed yet. He was banged up pretty good,” she said.

Times staff writers Caitlin Liu and Zanto Peabody contributed to this story.