San Francisco,CA-Police Officer Shot/LODD 12-22-06

[Truck4 48]

Date: 12-22-06

Time: 2018hrs

Location: 1631 25th Ave

Description: P.O. in foot pursuit of a male wanted for robberies and reportedly armed. Suspect forced his way into the garage of a house and shot the Officer. Another officer returned fire and killed the perp.

Writer: Truck4

San Francisco Chronicle:

A San Francisco police officer was shot to death Friday night while trying to arrest a wanted man in the Sunset District, authorities said today. The fugitive also was killed.

Officer Bryan Tuvera, 28, a four-year veteran of the force who worked out of the department's Taraval station, died at 12:01 a.m. today at San Francisco General Hospital.

The events that led to Tuvera's death started at 8:18 p.m. when he and another officer tried to serve a felony arrest warrant on a man in the area of 25th Avenue and Lawton Street. The suspect was described as armed and dangerous.

Police Chief Heather Fong said at a news conference this morning that the man was "suspected of robberies and possible burglaries in the Taraval district. The suspect they were looking for also had a no-bail felony warrant for escape."

Authorities identified the suspect as Marlon Ruff, 33. Fong did not go into details about the circumstances of the escape or where Ruff had been in custody.

Fong said officers had set up a perimeter at 25th and 26th avenues and Moraga and Lawton streets.

During the search, Tuvera and his partner located and pursued Ruff on foot to a two-story home at 1631 25th Ave. There, Fong said, the suspect "kicked in a tradesman's entrance and entered the garage.''

"Shortly after the officers entered the garage, the suspect turned and fired at the officers, striking our victim officer," Fong said. "That officer fell, and the second officer continued the pursuit and returned fire on the suspect. The suspect ran into an adjoining area and collapsed.''

Firefighters rushed Tuvera to San Francisco General Hospital, where a team of surgeons led by Dr. Geoffrey Manley, chief of neurotrauma, tried in vain to save his life.

Dozens of officers, in uniform and plainclothes, gathered in the hospital parking lot outside the emergency room entrance and waited for news of their colleague. They chain smoked, drank coffee and held group prayers. After word came of Tuvera's death, the officers embraced and wept.

"I just lost a good friend,'' said one distraught officer into his cell phone, before grasping his head between his hands and sobbing.

"Our department has suffered the loss of another officer who put his life on the line to protect the people of our great city," Fong said. "We extend our deepest condolences to the officer's family and to the officer's friends."

Ruff is not believed to have had any connection to the house on 25th Avenue where the shootings took place.

A resident of the house, Alex Hunter, 82, said he had been watching television with his wife in the living room when he "heard a lot of bumping and thumping and gunshot sounds.''

The Hunters, who have lived in the home for more than 30 years, went downstairs to find police swarming around their house and running through their garage door.

"It was bizarre,'' Hunter said, still shaken up. "It's just totally divorced from our regular lives. It's like a parallel universe.''

By mid-morning, the door that Ruff had kicked in had been replaced. A sign requested that flowers not be left outside the garage but be taken to Taraval police station.

There, several bouquets of poinsettias, roses and carnations had been left in front of the station, along with a note that said, "Our thoughts are with you.''

Officers normally scheduled to work at Taraval were given the day off for mourning, and were replaced by officers from other stations.

"It's like losing a family member; we're a close-knit group,'' said Officer Ignacio Martinez, who normally works at Ingleside station but was behind the desk at Taraval station. Like other officers, he was wearing a black fabric band over his police badge.

Tuvera is the third member of the Police Department to die this year in the line of duty.

Nick-Tomasito Birco, 39, died July 26 of injuries he suffered when his cruiser was hit by a van carrying four robbery suspects who allegedly were fleeing from other officers.

Sgt. Darryl Tsujimoto, 41, a 13-year department veteran, died of a heart attack May 1 during a canine training exercise on Treasure Island.