Manhunt underway for gunman who shot two police officers in Northern California

An hours-long manhunt was underway late Wednesday in Bay Area neighborhood for a gunman who violently evaded a traffic stop by shooting at and wounding two police officers, authorities said.

The search for the gunman effectively shut down several blocks Fremont for more than five hours, with police asking residents to stay inside and take shelter.

Fremont police tried to pull over a vehicle about 1:30 p.m., but the driver reversed his car into a police cruiser and opened fire at a police officer who had been with the department for about a year, Fremont police spokeswoman Officer Geneva Bosques said.

The officer was injured and rushed to the hospital after the car sped away, police said in a statement.

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Within 10 minutes, officers encountered the vehicle about half a mile away, police said. Someone in the vehicle shot and wounded a second police officer, a detective who had worked about 10 years on the force.

Both officers were taken to a hospital. One was said to be stable and the other officer was in critical condition, police said.

Law enforcement conducted a “slow and methodical” search for the gunman, with the Alameda County sheriff’s office deploying tactical teams that moved house-to-house to detain the man. Police asked the public to avoid a perimeter in the city’s Irvington neighborhood.

The search for the gunman entered its fifth hour, with police and sheriff’s deputies circling in on a location where the suspect was believed to be inside or nearby, sheriff’s officials said.

Police described the suspect as a 6-foot-tall Latino man wearing shorts and a San Francisco Giants shirt. It’s unclear why officers initially attempted to stop the vehicle.

matt.hamilton@latimes.com

For more California news, follow me @MattHjourno.

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UPDATES:

11:03 p.m.: This story was updated with additional details about the search effort.

This story was originally published at 6:40 p.m.