Police Kill Transient After Hospital Stabbing

A local transient was shot to death by police late Saturday after he stabbed three people inside the emergency room lobby at Community Memorial Hospital and then came at officers with a knife, authorities said Sunday.

The stabbing victims were two unarmed security guards and a hospital maintenance worker. Each suffered minor injuries and was treated and released, police said.

The suspect, a man familiar to some hospital workers and police officers who had spoken with him several times on the street, died on the operating table about two hours after he was shot.

His name was being withheld pending notification of his family.

The shooting, which authorities said was the first case of hospital workplace violence in the county in nearly two decades, occurred about 10:30 p.m.

Police described the scene as chaotic, with more than a dozen people, including patients, their family members and employees, crouched behind desks and holed up in examination rooms.

According to police, the suspect walked into Community Memorial shortly after 10 p.m. and went to the emergency room waiting area. An employee at Ventura County Medical Center, which is about a block away, said the suspect had come to that hospital earlier that evening seeking help but left without being examined.

At Community Memorial, two security guards who were patrolling the emergency room approached the man and asked him if he needed help.

“It was the time of night where no visiting was going on and they were not sure why he was there,” said Ventura Police Lt. Carl Handy.

The suspect allegedly punched one of the guards and then stabbed him once in the neck with a 2-inch pocketknife, authorities said.

The second guard, Handy said, was stabbed in the stomach area, and a hospital employee whose job it is to back up security guards during disturbances, suffered a cut to the head.

A hospital worker called 911 at 10:10 p.m., before the stabbings, to alert authorities that guards were dealing with a man who was armed with a knife, Handy said.

Officers called the hospital back two minutes later to check on the situation and were told to respond, Handy said. When they arrived two minutes later, officers found the suspect still in the waiting area and the stabbing victims being treated in nearby examination rooms.

“They contained the area and tried to calm him down,” Handy said.

During the next 15 minutes, when talks failed to get the suspect to surrender, officers fired one or two nonlethal rounds at the suspect and about six rubber projectiles, authorities said.

“Those didn’t stop him, and he came at officers with the knife, and he was shot once with a 9-millimeter,” Handy said.

The lieutenant would not discuss how far away the suspect was from the officer when he was shot. An administrative review of the incident will be undertaken. The officer has been interviewed and placed on paid leave.

The shooting will probably prompt hospital officials to review their security procedures.

Anyone entering Community Memorial’s emergency room late in the evening has access only to the lobby and waiting room. Admitting staff are separated from the public by inch-thick bulletproof glass.

Although the largest hospitals in Ventura County have at least one security guard on duty 24 hours a day, none have armed guards and none use metal detectors.