The standoff began shortly after a man in Winnetka called 911 saying he had gunned down three relatives. It ended early Thursday -- more than eight hours later -- with a single round from a police sniper who killed the suspect as he emerged from his burning house firing a barrage of bullets. In between, two highly decorated Los Angeles Police Department officers were shot, one fatally.
The LAPD was deeply shaken by the nightlong siege in an otherwise quiet San Fernando Valley neighborhood. Officer Randal Simmons, described as "the rock" of the elite SWAT team, became the first member in its four-decade history to die in the line of duty, taking a gunshot to the neck as the unit stormed the house in an unsuccessful attempt to rescue hostages and end the conflict.
A fellow SWAT officer, James Veenstra, was shot and seriously wounded but was expected to recover.
The genesis of the violence was not immediately clear but appeared to involve a dispute between the shooter and his brothers and father. The dead family members were indentified today by coroner's officials as Gerardo Rivera, 54, and his sons, Endi Rivera, 25, Edgar Rivera, 21, and Edwin Rivera, 20. The father was an immigrant from El Salvador who ran a trucking company.
(Based on friends and relatives statements, an earlier version of this story cited the identifications as Gerardo Rivera, 50; Edgar, 19; Edwin, 20; and Andy, 21.) Autopsies are planned for as early as Saturday, said Capt. Ed Winter of the Coroner's Department.
Police have not officially said which of the sons was the shooter. Multiple police sources, however, identified him as Edwin Rivera. And coroner's officials today identified Edwin as the individual who was shot and killed outside the home. An LAPD news conference is scheduled for 4:30 p.m.
Friends and relatives said there had been strains in the family involving the father's relationship with a girlfriend. The boys' mother died seven or eight years ago, family members said. A friend, Jose Ortiz, 21, said Edwin was a Reseda High School dropout.
"I don't know what would make him do something like that," Ortiz said. "I never would have expected this to happen."
Antonio Rivera, 28, of Panorama City said he was the brother of Gerardo Rivera and the uncle of the three young men and a fourth brother who was living on his own. He said that Gerardo Rivera came to the United States about 25 years ago and that all of his sons were born in this country.
Reflecting on the violence that had just occurred, he said: "You never know when something happens in the mind."
Of those inside the house, the only known survivor was a woman, believed to have been the father's girlfriend, who escaped before dawn Thursday when police fired tear gas into the house and knocked down a back wall in an attempt to expose the shooter. She was taken to a hospital, apparently for treatment of tear gas inhalation, but was not believed to be seriously hurt.
The shootout marked perhaps the worst day in the history of the Special Weapons and Tactics Unit, created in the late 1960s and formalized in 1971 to deal with especially dangerous situations. It handles about 100 incidents a year involving barricaded suspects but had never lost an officer in the line of duty. (SWAT Officer Louis Villalobos died during a training accident in 2000 and was awarded the Medal of Valor.)
"Today is a sad and tragic day in the city of Los Angeles," a grim-faced Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa said at a news conference near the shooting scene. With him were Police Chief William J. Bratton, who had rushed back to L.A. from a conference in Vancouver, Canada, and a phalanx of other city officials and police brass. As Bratton spoke of Simmons, recalling the work that the fallen officer had done for children, Assistant Chief James McDonnell wiped tears from his eyes.
Earlier, McDonnell had called Simmons and Veenstra, both 51 and veterans of the SWAT team, "two of the best in the country at what they do." Simmons, a married father of two teenagers, had been on the force for 27 years, 20 with the SWAT unit. Results of an autopsy on Simmons' body could come as soon as this afternoon, officials said this morning.
Bratton said condolences had poured in to the LAPD from SWAT units all over the world. SWAT officers nationally and internationally train together, and many officers in other departments knew Simmons. The death was a blow to this tight-knit and proud police subculture, he said.
"About as tough as you can get, these officers. This tears them up," Bratton said.
The incident began about 9 p.m. Wednesday when a man called 911 and said he had killed three people at a home in the 19800 block of Welby Way in the Valley neighborhood of Winnetka. Neighbors described the area as close-knit and quiet.
"A helicopter flying overhead is a big thing around here," said Elisa Jones, who lives directly behind the gunman's home -- a white, one-story ranch-style house with a sloping shingle roof.
Police surrounded the residence, which is owned by Gerardo Rivera, according to property records.
Because they had been led to believe that as many as six people might be in the house, and that at least some of them might be alive and in danger, a decision was made to send in a SWAT team about 12:30 a.m. At some point, a police dispatcher reported hearing moaning in the background as she spoke to the suspect, authorities said.
"There are times when you have to act because there's an individual whose life is at risk," McDonnell said.
Deputy Chief Michael Hillmann, an early member of the SWAT team, said the "rapid deployment" strategy used by officers was devised after the 1999 Columbine school shooting in Colorado, where law enforcement officials came under heavy criticism for holding off on a quick assault against two students who were killing classmates.
Hillmann and a team of LAPD officers traveled to the region to interview many of the police involved. From that, the LAPD developed plans to take action quickly in situations involving "active shooters," in which people's lives are in immediate danger and police don't have the time to devise a more deliberate strategy.
On Thursday, while one group of SWAT officers fired their guns along the side of the house to create a diversion, another team entered through the front door, officials said, tossing in a "flash bang" grenade intended to disorient the suspect by creating a blinding light. But once in the door, the officers discovered a low wall that may have blocked their view -- and may have stopped the grenade from having its full effect on the suspect, authorities said.
As the officers made their way along the wall, officials said, the suspect popped up and shot Veenstra from about 10 to 15 feet away, hitting him in the face. The other officers returned fire, but the suspect shot Simmons in the neck and the bullet pierced his brain stem, according to a high-ranking police official who asked not to be identified. Both officers were wearing helmets and bulletproof vests.
The remaining officers spotted a victim who appeared to still be alive and managed to pull him and the two wounded officers out of the house and onto the front lawn, where Fire Department paramedics administered medical aid. The civilian victim was already dead, authorities said, but Simmons and Veenstra were rushed to Northridge Hospital Medical Center. Simmons died just after 1 a.m., officials said.
After the initial assault on the house, police persuaded two relatives of the suspect to place phone calls and use a bullhorn in an attempt to talk to him, but those efforts were met with "absolute silence," said Deputy Chief Michel Moore, the incident commander.
Some time after 5 a.m., police fired tear gas canisters into the house and used an armored vehicle with a battering ram to knock down a rear wall. It was then that the woman ran out of the house. Police did not immediately identify her, but family members said they believed she was Elba Rivera, the girlfriend of Gerardo Rivera.
"At this point, she does appear to be a victim," Moore said. The woman told investigators she had hidden in a closet during the standoff.
Soon after the tear gas canisters exploded, authorities noticed that the house was on fire. A short time later, the suspect came out of the house, shooting, and was felled by a single shot to the neck, police said. Because the three brothers in the family were so close in age, police were not immediately certain which of them was the shooter.
Veenstra, a veteran member of the tactical team who is married to a police captain, Michelle Veenstra, underwent a three-hour operation that doctors said would be the first of many. His prognosis is "very good," said Gabriel Aslanian, a surgeon who was one of the doctors operating on him.
Aslanian said the officer was "very fortunate" because the bullet lodged in his jaw.
Veenstra was described as a solid, "all-around officer" by friend and longtime colleague Richard Wemmer, a retired LAPD captain.
Among his visitors at the hospital Thursday was retired LAPD Chief Daryl F. Gates, who said he had known both Veenstra and Simmons for many years. He said he had tried to assign both to leadership positions in the department but couldn't get them to leave SWAT.
"You couldn't pry either one of them out of the squad," he said.
Gates choked up as he spoke about Simmons. He said their first meeting had been in a hospital, where the officer was recovering from a gunshot wound.
"The first time I saw him was at the hospital; now I'm seeing him at the hospital again," he said. "This is very, very hard for me."
