Oakland

Oakland Officer Shot, Injured; Suspect in Custody After Brief Standoff: OPD

Man in his 50s opened fire on police and was shot and wounded when an officer returned fire

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An Oakland police officer was shot and injured Wednesday morning, and fellow officers surrounded the shooter at a second scene until the suspect surrendered, according to the police department.

OPD was working two crime scenes, the first in the 2100 block of Telegraph Avenue, where the officer was shot and a gun was recovered, police said. The injured officer returned fire and struck the suspect.

The injured officer was taken to a hospital in stable condition, police said.

"Had a chance to talk to him, had a chance to hear from him, so that was good," OPD Chief LeRonne Armstrong said.

The second scene was in the 2100 block of Martin Luther King Boulevard, where the suspect was barricaded in a housing complex for veterans and armed with a knife for a brief time before being taken into custody, police said. A knife was recovered at that scene.

Sherlyn Wilson, who lives on the fifth floor of the complex, was worried the situation would trigger one of her neighbors to step in.

"I was just worried that he would come to our floors, and I didn’t know if he had a weapon because a lot of us are holding weapons, so that was the biggest worry," Wilson said.

OPD called in its crisis intervention unit, mental health responders, negotiators and a tactical unit to persuade the man to come out peacefully.

Both shootings, including the one that injured the suspect, are under investigation, police said.

The suspect was identified only as a man in his 50s. The wounded officer was not identified.

The standoff used so much of OPD’s shrinking manpower that the department had to call in mutual aid from the Alameda County Sheriff’s Office, Berkeley police, California Highway Patrol and San Leandro police to help respond to other 911 calls.

"Obviously we have staffing shortages," Armstrong said.

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