Remembering a Devoted Dad and Deputy

Kathy Parsons on Tuesday described her late husband, Orange County Sheriff’s Deputy Steve Parsons, as a devoted family man and recalled how he opened presents from their two children on Father’s Day, the day before he was mortally injured when his motorcycle was broadsided.

“He was an absolutely wonderful father,” said Parsons, a trauma nurse at Saddleback Memorial Medical Center in Laguna Hills. “He would take the kids everywhere he went.”

His Father’s Day gift was a stereo, which he spent the day assembling, and artwork from the children.

“It was a very good day,” his widow said softly.

The deputy, 36, died late Saturday. He had been in a medically induced coma since the June 19 accident as doctors operated to reduce swelling in his brain. He also had broken bones and internal injuries after the accident, in which a car ran a red light at Moulton Parkway and Laguna Hills Drive, struck him about 50 mph and threw him 60 feet through the air, officials said.

Last weekend, Parsons had to tell their 6-year-old daughter, Kelsey, and 3-year-old son, Nathan, that their beloved father had died. “I told [the kids] about the accident that day,” she said. “I took my daughter to see him the second day, and he still looked very good, despite all the mechanical things hanging on him.”

Parsons kept her composure while fielding questions at a packed news conference at the Aliso Viejo sheriff’s station.

She sat with her brother, Michael Gorman of Huntington Beach, who described his late brother-in-law as an outgoing person who wore Hawaiian shirts and sandals on his days off. The two had enjoyed kayaking together, he said.

“He wouldn’t have been the same person without his motorcycle,” Gorman said. “That’s where he belonged.”

Kathy Parsons agreed that Steve loved his job, and though she worried about the risks involved in his job as a motorcycle officer, she didn’t want him to give up his beat.

“He didn’t like to be confined, and a car can be very confining,” Parsons said, her quiet voice quavering. “He liked that feeling of freedom.”

She said her husband had not planned to spend his whole career as a motorcycle officer. A 10-year department veteran who graduated from Costa Mesa High School and held a bachelor’s and a master’s degree, he wanted eventually to work with an accident reconstruction team, she said.

The couple were married for more than 10 years. They met when she was 17 and they worked together at Marshall’s department store in Costa Mesa.

Parsons said Tuesday she doesn’t want any harm to come to the car’s driver, Sylvia Steinhardt, 77, of Laguna Hills.

“I haven’t met her,” she said. “I don’t want her to be hurt in any way. She has her own thing to deal with.”

Authorities say Steinhardt apparently did not see the traffic signal and struck Parsons, the first Orange County motorcycle deputy to die in the line of duty, without slowing down.

The California Highway Patrol’s investigation of the crash could take months, said Officer Bruce Lian, the agency’s spokesman.

“It started off as an accident with somebody running a red light,” Lian said. “But there’s always the possibility that the charges could be enhanced because someone died.’

He said he does not know whether the CHP will recommend that criminal charges be filed.

Some of the deputy’s colleagues in the Sheriff’s Department came to the news conference and spoke emotionally of the blow that Parsons’ death dealt to them.

“It will take the department a very long time to get over this,” said Deputy Don Barnes, a patrol officer who once worked with Parsons at the Orange County Jail. “We are going to be suffering for a long time.”

Barnes said Parsons was motivated to help people and try to instill responsible driving habits in the community, not to achieve recognition or awards for his efforts.

“He was responsible for so much reduction in traffic accidents,” Barnes said, his voice breaking with emotion. “When people make it home safely every day, they don’t realize guys like [Parsons] made it possible.”

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Times correspondent Alex Katz contributed to this report.