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San Diego Shooting Kills One Police Officer; Seriously Wounds Another

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San Diego Police SWAT officers prepare to enter house with a possible suspect inside in San Diego, July 29, 2016.
San Diego Police SWAT officers prepare to enter house with a possible suspect inside in San Diego, July 29, 2016.

One police officer was killed and another seriously injured in a shooting late Thursday in Southern California, in the city of San Diego.

The shooting took place in a neighborhood where the two officers had made a routine stop, authorities said. An emergency radio call for help followed almost immediately. Officers who rushed to the scene found both men shot and bleeding, one of them with multiple gunshot wounds in the chest.

Fellow officers put the gravely wounded officer in a squad car and drove to a hospital while performing life-saving procedures, but "I'm heartbroken to report they were unable to save his life," Police Chief Shelley Zimmerman said.

Officer Jonathan DeGuzman, who was 43, had a wife and two children, and had been a police officer for 16 years.

The injured officer, 32-year-old Wade Irwin, underwent surgery and is expected to survive, the police chief said on Twitter.

One suspect was taken into custody a short time after the initial radio call. Police found him in a nearby ravine. He reportedly was in critical condition with a gunshot wound and has been hospitalized.

Police mounted an intensive search throughout the night for a second suspect. They called out to residents to remain inside their homes as they scoured yards, streets, alleys and ravines.

About nine hours after the shooting, police surrounded a home about a kilometer away and said they were trying to get someone inside to surrender. Zimmerman said they had information that led them to the scene, but she declined to discuss details. The person they were looking for, Marcus Antonio Cassani, was eventually arrested near the shooting site on an unrelated warrant Friday morning.

The chief said DeGuzman and Irwin were wearing bulletproof vests when they were shot, and both had been wearing body cameras.

San Diego Police Chief Shelley Zimmerman speaks to reporters. (@SanDiegoPD)
San Diego Police Chief Shelley Zimmerman speaks to reporters. (@SanDiegoPD)

'Violence against us all'

The San Diego shooting, the latest in a monthlong series of controversial shootings involving police, attracted political attention immediately.

Commenting on Friday's news on Twitter, Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump said: "Two policemen just shot in San Diego, one dead. It is only getting worse. People want LAW AND ORDER!"

The issues of gun violence, police safety, and police brutality all have been major topics of discussion during political campaigns this year, and police across the U.S. have been on alert following the killing of several officers in the cities of Dallas and Baton Rouge in recent weeks.

San Diego's mayor, Kevin Faulconer, said, "Violence against the men and women who wear the badge is violence against us all." He called on everyone "to join together in support of our officers. ... We need them and they need us."

Attorney General Loretta Lynch, the top U.S. law-enforcement official, took note of the San Diego police shooting during a meeting she held Friday in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, which was the scene of a recent controversial shooting of a civilian and, a short time later, a deliberate attack by a gunman who killed three officers.

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