Officer Charles Sciortino shot during "routine" traffic stop
"It was just a routine traffic stop," said Officer Charles Sciortino, explaining the events prior to the Dec. 30, 1996 shooting that nearly killed him. "Routine," he added, tears welling in his eyes.
About 8:30 p.m., as the two officers were sitting in their patrol car in a 7-Eleven parking lot on Van Buren Boulevard, they spotted a man, later identified as Tyrone Kirksey, driving by in a van. The man had a glassy look about his eyes, Stevens said, and they decided to follow the van.
When the vehicle passed across the center divider, the pair believed they had a man who was driving under the influence.
Stevens, who celebrated his fourth wedding anniversary with his wife three nights earlier, got out first. As Stevens used his flashlight to look inside the van from the passenger's side, Sciortino walked over to the driver and asked for his license.
Without warning, as Sciortino was looking at the driver's license, Kirksey began firing.
"I heard three or four shots," Stevens said. "But I didn't know who was firing. I wasn't sure what was going on.
Panic set in. Stevens, who has a 3-year-old daughter, stepped toward the patrol car. He saw saw blood flowing onto Sciortino's uniform. Then he saw the officer go down.
"I was petrified," he said. "When you see your partner bleeding like that, it's terrifying."
He fired seven shots. Four hit the van. None hit Kirksey.
OFFICER SCIORTINO'S RECOLLECTIONS
He remembered his arm being paralyzed, being unable to reach for his gun, diving under Kirksey's van for cover.
He remembered everything turning black as he lay critically wounded in the ambulance, hearing Sergeant Vance Hardin screaming at him to hold on, thinking he was going to die while being rushed to Riverside General Hospital.
Officer Sciortino was shot on his mother's birthday. He had just bought a bouquet of roses. Left them on the coffee table in the living room with a card telling her how much he loved her.
When they pulled the driver over in an Orangecrest neighborhood, Sciortino and partner Chris Stevens thought they had a man who was driving under the influence.
Stevens told Sciortino he had a bad feeling about the stop. Sciortino, 24, agreed.
"You know," he recalled telling Stevens, "I hate walking up to vans. You can't see everything. They're up so high."
As Stevens ran the van's plates on a mobile computer in the squad car, Sciortino walked up to Kirksey, unaware there was a warrant out for the driver's arrest.
Kirksey, it turned out, had violated parole. And he had promised an uncle that he was not going back to prison, that he would kill rather than get locked up again.
Sciortino remembered Kirksey handing him his license then he pulled out the gun and started shooting.
He remembers Stevens holding his hand, ripping off his shirt, looking for the bullet wound that was pouring blood onto his uniform.
He remembers a California Highway Patrol officer finding the bullet hole and using his first aid training to slow the bleeding.
He remembers the ride in the ambulance.
"The paramedic kept calling out the streets as we passed by," he said. "Van Buren and Washington. Van Buren and Mockingbird Canyon. Van Buren and Victoria. I remember my sergeant, Vance Hardin, yelling at me, saying, `Don't die! Don't die!'"
He remembers later hearing the voices, but not seeing a thing, his eyes wide open, thinking he was on his way to heaven.
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This was intense, my adrenaline was pumping just listening to it! I hope they found this asshole and gave them a reason and made him into Swiss cheese!
truckindawg1 1 month ago 3