Man Slain in Standoff With Police

A man who stabbed his girlfriend and her teenage son was shot to death by police Monday in San Pedro after he threatened officers with a knife and withstood several shots from a beanbag gun, authorities said.

Richard Rodriguez, 27, of San Pedro, was killed about 7 a.m. in the backyard of a home on Via Navarra, a quiet street of stucco and tile houses off Gaffey Street. The family that lives in the house was not home.

LAPD Sgt. John Pasquariello, a department spokesman, said a woman called police at 6:50 a.m., saying she and her 15-year-old son had been stabbed by her boyfriend in her apartment in the 1300 block of Park Western Drive and the boyfriend had fled. Both were critically wounded, police said.

Authorities said Rodriguez eluded them until they cordoned off the neighborhood and spotted a man carrying a butcher knife, going into the backyard on nearby Via Navarra.

Pasquariello said officers from the LAPD’s Harbor Division tried to persuade Rodriguez to drop the knife. When he refused, Pasquariello said, police fired four rounds from a beanbag gun and tried to use a Taser, which carries a powerful electrical charge.

But Rodriguez continued to resist and was fatally shot by a sergeant when he lunged at one of the officers, police said. Rodriguez reportedly suffered multiple gunshot wounds and died at the scene.

“The beanbags struck with little effect. Then they went to the Taser. I don’t think it was of any use either,” Pasquariello said. “The officers gradually escalated the use of force from verbal commands to nonlethal weapons to the use of deadly force.”

Police said the woman and her son were taken to Harbor/UCLA Medical Center in Torrance, where they were in critical but stable condition. Authorities declined to release their names.

As is routine, the shooting is being investigated by both the Police Department’s officer-involved shooting team and the district attorney’s office.

On Monday afternoon, officers were interviewing residents of the neighborhood, and Via Navarra and Park Western were blocked off by patrol cars and yellow police tape for most of the day.

Except for the officers, Pasquariello said, there were no witnesses to the shooting and few people who saw Rodriguez run through the neighborhood.

The incident was the latest of several shootings involving Los Angeles police officers in the last several days.

Last Wednesday, officers shot Cristobal Garcia, 27, of Los Angeles, as he stabbed his girlfriend with a screwdriver. He was seriously wounded in the chest.

On Friday, officers shot and killed Felix Chagolla, 26, of Los Angeles, who was carrying what turned out to be a fake grenade. Authorities had chased him through the crowded Los Amigos mall near USC. Three bystanders were wounded by police gunfire.

Six hours after Chagolla was shot, an LAPD officer at the same mall opened fire again, killing a dog that was snarling and threatening him and several other officers, authorities said.