California Highway Police Officer and Suspect Dead, 2 Other Officers Wounded in Shootout

It is with great sadness that we share an officer from @CHPInland Division out of our @ChpRiverside office has lost his life serving the people of California. Rest easy brother, we got it from here. https://t.co/np4YYdKbR0

— CHP Valley Division (@CHP_Valley) August 13, 2019

A California Highway Patrol officer and gunman were dead and two other CHP officers were injured following a shootout near the 215 Freeway in the Riverside area Monday, officials said.

The suspect had grabbed a weapon and started firing after CHP pulled over his vehicle on an overpass at Eucalyptus Avenue, Riverside Police Officer Ryan Railsback said.

Railsback could not provide information on the surviving officer’s conditions.

Officials haven’t provided any further detail about what led up to the fatal confrontation. But Witness Charles Childress said the truck involved appeared to have been pulled over a while before gunfire erupted.

Childress said he was driving to Sycamore Canyon Park with his dog when he saw two CHP units had stopped a white pickup on the side of the overpass.

“Obviously they’d been there for a while,” Childress said. “The gentleman was outside the car. It looks like they had let him take his property out of his truck and were getting ready to tow it.”

Childress heard gunshots when he went back across the overpass after about 10 or 20 minutes at the park. Having spent 21 years in the Marine Corps., he said he “recognized them as shots automatically.”

Multiple gunshots and sirens can be heard in video shot by a freelance photographer at the scene.

Two officers could be seen on the ground near CHP vehicles.

A Moreno Valley Police Department officer pulls a long gun from the back of his patrol car. He and other officers are positioned behind their vehicles with guns raised.

Another officer then appears to drag one wounded officer along the pavement, away from the gunfire. Three officers load the wounded man into a Moreno Valley patrol car that pulls up.

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