courtesy LAPD and youtube.com

We included a story in the digest last night about the French who are considering arming all police officers. And despite their status as one of the world’s most gun-controlled utopias, the unarmed bobby is gradually going the way of the dodo in the UK. 

Meanwhile, here in the US, despite a generational drop in crime that has seen violent and gun-related crime rates drop to historic lows (thanks, President Clinton!) law enforcement officers carry sidearms because we recognize that there are still (and always will be) bad people who do bad things, sometime with a firearm.

Take, for instance, Richard Mendoza, a gang-affiliated ex-con who was apparently well-known to Los Angeles police officers and was the subject of a routine traffic stop back in July.

As the LA Times reports,

Recordings from inside a police cruiser and the officers’ body cameras captured what seems to begin as a routine traffic stop that suddenly explodes into violence as the gunman pulls a .380-caliber handgun from his side and shoots the female officer who is standing just inches away.

You can skip to the 2:20 mark in this video to see to the dashcam recording of the incident. Some may consider this NSFW.

Officers on the police car camera are seen pulling over Mendoza, who was driving a silver Nissan Altima on Noble Avenue in North Hills at about 10:15 p.m. July 27. The female officer approaches the driver’s-side door while her partner goes to the passenger-side door. …

She asks him to step out of the vehicle.

“You don’t have anything on you, right?” the officer asks. She then opens the driver’s-side door, but as Mendoza steps toward her, he draws the handgun from his right side and fires at close range. Her body camera captures the gun pointing directly at her chest.

The female officer’s bodycam footage starts at 5:02 above. The male officer’s bodycam footage starts at 6:33.

Mendoza fires with his right hand at the female officer, hitting her and then swivels to shoot over the car rooftop at her partner. The male officer ducks and leans over the Altima, firing at Mendoza before coming behind the vehicle to the driver’s side and shooting again. The female officer can be heard screaming in pain.

The un-named officer was shot in the left leg with a .380 round, shattering her femur. She is recovering. Officer Miguel Alarcon was the officer who shot and killed Medoza, The shooting is still under department investigation.

Mendoza, who went by the name of “Biz,” was known by the LAPD as a member of the Vincent Town street gang. He has prior convictions for possession of a firearm by a felon and narcotics for sales, according to the LAPD and court records.

Yet another testament to the power and effectiveness of gun control laws and their impact on criminals.

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63 COMMENTS

  1. Glad they’re investigating it. Who knows, they might find that Mendoza was ‘the victim.’ Couldn’t the officer have used less force? Fired fewer times? Aimed for his lower leg, or his right hand? The idiocy — a criminal idiocy — of the progressive / liberal / communist left knows no bounds, I think we know too well.

    Alarcon should receive medals and a raise. Any time a cop kills scum like this, bonus and medals. Yes, yes, I know, that would encourage ‘bad behavior.’ Look, these cops — as imperfect and human as they are (sounds like us!) — lay their lives on the line every day, every moment. Who knows when someone draws on them and kills them? Thank God they’re out there.

    Glad those two officers traveled together. A lot of cops travel solo. That would have been the end, most likely, of the officer who was shot.

    • 4,000 newtons is the number thrown around to break a femur. Is that an average of everyone or adult males? Not sure. Blazer’s .380 would have only about 2,750 newtons at point blank from a 3.5in barrel. That said, research shows that bone breaks are heavily dependent on the angle of attack. Some researchers took bones from a recently deceased person and subjected them to force from different angles. From one angle, they could break it with 375 joules; from another, it took almost 10,000. The structure of the bone provides much better strength in some places than others. So the ‘average’ of 4,000 newtons needed might not matter as much as the way the bullet happens to hit, as impossible as it is to predict it.

      So the lesson is, don’t get shot, if you can help it. Even by a .380.

      • A Perfecta (Fiochhi) .380 FMJ from my LCP Custom will pass thru a solid 4″ Maple block of wood and still have a lot of steam left. Most others go only 1 or 2″.

  4. She’s very lucky.
    A .380 is derided as ineffective but at close range it shattered her leg and took her out of the fight. If he had gotten the second cop he would have executed her right there.
    They wasted medical resources on old Biz . He should have bled out at the curb.

    • Too bad there was video. Very likely that the punk that he shot and killed — just to be sure the threat was over — was one of the scum who will do the same stuff again and again. The pharmacist did society a favor. And he ends up in prison.

      • This story about the pharmacist is very disturbing. this could happen to any one of us. There are people in this country working their butts off to get convicted cop killers freed, but this pharmacist is going to die in jail for protecting his property and employees.

    • The fact that, that shot is even an issue, is the reason we have police who are afraid to engage active shooters.

      • That shot’s not an issue in LA county, if it was, they wouldn’t have produced this glowing ‘look at how great Officer Alarcon is’ video showing it.
        I’m not interested in nit-picking Alarcon and jamming him up for ending a good shoot one second too late.
        I might have been able to take his place in this fight, but only if I already had a gun in my hand. He drew after Mendoza fired his first shot, something which would have reduced my odds in this particular fight from not great to very slim. Mendoza was good, surprisingly good for a guy his size.

        If one of the stumble-fucks who tried to murder the newspaper ladies and the surfer dude in the middle of the Dorner manhunt had been in Alarcon’s shoes, Mendoza probably would have won this fight.
        Now there’s a bunch of cops who clearly belong in prison. And the fact that NOTHING was done to them for it shows us that Alarcon has nothing to worry about when he’s 99% less in the wrong than they were.

    • No way of knowing the bad guy was no longer a threat. For all that cop knew, he could have missed the shots through the car and the bad guy was ducking for cover. That “insurance shot” was just the officer neutralizing the threat by shooting the body part most available to him at the time. If you’re leaving cover or concealment to assist a fellow officer (or citizen) and the threat is still there, you make damn sure that threat is no longer a threat before you do anything else. Otherwise might as well just add your name to the body count.

      I’m honestly surprised he *only* fired one more time once he got around that car. People can be deadly even after you poke a few new holes in them. That magazine capacity is there for a reason — use it.

      • If the bad guy is still holding a gun, he’s still a threat as long as he may be conscious and capable of raising it. The way he shot the first cop, he seems the type to play possum.

      • Agree completely. He is his partner’s backup, now he and she have no backup, if the guy still has a gun and is breathing, he is a threat. If he actually is not a threat, then he won’t notice 3 or 4 more holes.

        • Well put, Larry. If he’s still a threat — and very possibly is — the extra holes are absolutely required. If he’s non-threatening, why would he care?? As you say, he won’t notice the extra holes.

  8. You can tell that poor Richard Mendoza was turning his life around by his choice of a less lethal cartridge and the way he shot it.

    Had he been an unrepentant gangster, he would have shot the officer with a fotay, held sideways.

    I predict that had Mendoza lived, in a few years he’d be carrying a .22 revolver.

    • lol … yes, just give these poor oppressed fellas time. Just a few more years, a few more robberies, rapes, murders … they gradually understand that indeed, they can carry a lower caliber pistol, and STILL rob, rape, and murder. Less cost on ammo, wider availability for the .22 … These scum aren’t entirely devoid of intelligence. They have zero morality, but a few points of IQ that can, and will, be developed over time.

  9. I did pick up some tactical info here.
    The right seat cop’s chest cam saw the draw, but the cop didn’t because his head was above the roof.

    Would it be a good idea to stay bend down so you can see inside the car at that point?

    The left seat cop, I’m not sure if she should have seen it or if his body was large enough to totally block the draw from her sight.

    • FedUp,

      I think your interpretation is correct on both counts: the female office could not see the driver draw and the male officer did not see the driver draw because the roof was in the way.

      Additionally, I noticed in the female officer’s body camera video footage that the male officer was frequently scanning the area and may simply have been looking off to the side when the driver started to get out of his car and draw his handgun.

  10. I want to see every police officer go home alive after his shift. However, unwarranted shootings of police officers during a traffic stop is the chance that police officers have to take…it’s a part of the job.
    That being said, I wonder if some of these shootings of police officers are a result of “blowback”–aggrieved individuals lashing out at perceived “injustices” meted out by police officers. These aggrieved individuals who lash out, seeing only the uniform and not the human being behind it.
    The two latest incidents of police misconduct that will probably be “swept under the rug” are the incidents where a police officer went to the wrong address and shot the legal occupant of his apartment. Police issued a search warrant against the victim. WTF?? The second case revolves around a Las Vegas hotel incident where the victim was ordered to place his hands behind his back while crawling. Despite following conflicting commands from multiple police officers, he was murdered by a cop who had the words “you’re f#cked” on the dust cover of his rifle. Of course, the “thin blue line” protects its own, as the murderer cop was never prosecuted and is back on the force. You can bet that any ordinary citizen who had such an inscription on his weapon would be prosecuted for pre-meditated murder even if the shooting was in self-defense.
    Police have a bad name because they do not get rid of the “bad apples”, shifting them around from department to department, not unlike the Catholic priest sex scandal.
    In many jurisdictions, police have become “the new centurions”–a “protected class” who can do no wrong and has declared us mere mundane civilians to be the “enemy”. Since American police departments are receiving Israeli-style training, I guess that “we are all Palestinians, now”.
    The only way for this situation to get resolved is demilitarization of police and getting rid of the “bad apples”, making sure that they never work in “law enforcement” ever again. Anything less than that will result in “blowback” perpetuating itself.

    • Guyger, she was totally in the wrong and the Rangers got an arrest warrant for Manslaughter over the weekend. Sounds like the DA wants 2nd Degree Murder, which was good enough for Ted Wafer in his own home and is probably the right charge for Guyger. I’m sure the DA will take it to a grand jury and get whatever charge she wants the GJ to give her, that’s the way the GJ process works.
      A trial jury will either convict her of manslaughter or set her free. You can tell a jury that deliberately shooting somebody under the mistaken belief it’s legal is Murder 2 and they’ll convict a guy like Wafer, but give them the same instructions and they’ll let a cop like Guyger walk.

      Brailsford wasn’t covered by the thin blue line, he was covered by a jury of ordinary taxpaying copsuckers who refused to convict him. He was just doing his job, putting his life on the line every day to protect us from evil guys in gym shorts crawling on the floor and begging for their lives…

      • To add to your comments, the dead guy’s apartment was a crime scene that the police are not allowed to search for evidence except that which is “plain view.” To do a thorough examination of the crime scene requires a warrant. This is SOP, and the people complaining about it have no clue what they are talking about. One of the issues in this case is whether there was a prior relationship between the parties, based on witness statements that the officer was (contrary to her statement) banging on the apartment door prior to her entry. All of that evidence–computers, phones, documents–requires a warrant to assure admissibility at trial.

    • Once again the hitler fan club chimes in and, oh, look, what a surprise, he’s anti cop l;ike antifa and blm.

      Wonder why these hate groups want the cops to go away?

    • If you want to want to make cops safer. Take away their cars and require they pass a military PT test quarterly. They are die from car wrecks and heart attacks far far more than from gun fire.

    • I think if you take it on yourself to shoot a cop without warning or reason, you must be prepared to be executed on the spot. It’s a part of the job.

      • Agreed, Larry. You want to shoot at a cop, or actually shoot a cop? Death should be the expected and deserved ending. Hell, if you shoot at anyone with intent to harm or kill (in a non-defensive situation; i.e., you’re the perp), you should be shot dead. One less scum walking around.

        • On the one hand, he didn’t want to get popped for carrying while under supervision.
          On the other hand, the chances of him getting away with a double cop killing were effectively zero, and the penalty for that is far worse than carrying concealed while on parole.

          Slipping the gun between the seat and console was probably the correct move. Once they take him out of the car, there’s no Terry Stop need to pat the car down for weapons. Or is he subject to having his car and home searched at any time for no reason until his parole is finished?

    • Ditto on the crime scene search warrant. I’ve personally written them multiple times. It seems redundant to have to get permission to search and seize evidence at the scene, but it’s still a home. The law requires it and there’s case law where the search of a homicide scene for evidence was tossed…. Along with all the evidence related to that scene.

  11. Crime is not dropping in the United States, not in reality.

    Crime is only dropping because the definition of “violent crime” is constantly being changed to exclude more and more crimes. Like this story in California. Anyone remember the case of Brock Turner from 2016, the Stanford student who got only 6 months for sexually assaulting an unconscious drunk girl? He got 6 months because sexual assault isn’t a “violent crime” in California.

    More on the subject of CA’s “violent crime” 1984-style redefinition here:

    http://www.latimes.com/politics/la-pol-sac-proposition-57-violent-crime-list-20170127-story.html

    • One of the mitigating factors in that case was that the perp was wasted too, and there was a bunch of “activity” going on before she passed out. Alcohol does, after all, reduce inhibitions, and these were college kids. But most thought the sentence too light–and as a result the judge lost his re-election bid.

    • Mendoza already sucker punched the copette once with a .380. She can be heard telling her partner to forget about her, take care of Mendoza (before he shoots you in the back). I agree with her.

      Cuff him and have the copette watch him while you work on her leg. With him in cuffs, she’ll be able to give you plenty of warning if Mendoza turns out to be ready for another fight.

    • Unless his brains are outside his head, you can’t assume he’s dead. It usually takes a couple minutes to really ‘die’ from non-head wounds. In that couple minutes he could do something very bad. There have been cases where criminals have overcome injuries that will surely be fatal just to kill one more person. Hell, there are lots of posthumous medals awarded to soldiers who did the same in battle.

    • Totally justified. He shot the female cop and shot.at him. Sorry, you don’t get any surrender at that point. In some towns the cop would have dumped the mag in him.. in others he would have emptied the gun, reloaded and liquidated him.
      The fact he only gave him one for the road shows a level of self control.

  14. The crim pulls a .380 and fires at extreme close range and only hits her in the leg? Obviously he pulled the trigger before he was lined up on her. Example of bad criminal training. We need to expose criminals to more advanced combat handgunning classes, so mistakes like this will improve survivability. 🙂

    We also need to provide the disadvantaged with the means to acquire adequate caliber firearms. Increasing the impact of drug laws should improve the financial opportunities for doing so. 🙂

    Of course, he might have been assuming the cop was wearing a vest and thus went for the more immediate less-lethal target, thereby establishing his superior tactical skills (and perhaps his compassionate nature.) My guess is this is less likely than lack of prior training and an inadequate caliber.

    Also, turning and firing at the second officer over the top of the car is less tactical than immediately moving to the protection of the front of the car, crouching down behind the engine block and only then engaging the second officer who is behind a relatively unprotected section of the car (albeit not so disadvantaged given the .380 caliber.) Taking advantage of the relative protection of the engine block may also allow a second to finish off the first officer with another shot to the head to be sure of not having to further engage her.

    However, clearly the crim firing at the first officer alerted the second officer – who probably had his hand on his firearm to begin with – and the crim thus had little time to duck around his car door to the engine block before the second officer returned fire and hit the crim in the head and chest quickly.

    This also reflects the problem of more or less point-blank shooting which cuts tactical response time down to almost zero. “Getting off the X” in real time is a lot harder than it seems in “training time.”

    The crim might have been better served in this case by ducking down and firing through the passenger side window at the second officer, regardless of any vest that the second officer might have been wearing, which might have enabled him to disable the second officer while avoiding the officer’s return fire, rather than firing over the top of the car which exposed him to the officer’s return fire. Again, however, the speed of the incident – literally five seconds or less from the time the crim opens his door and opens fire on the first officer to his hitting the ground, and perhaps a second at most to exchange fire with the second officer – makes it difficult to assume the outcome would have been any different.

    Clearly reaction time and having a prior tactical plan developed while in the car would have been the only possible way to avoid the outcome on the part of the crim. This would have required a considerable cool head and fast thinking on the part of the crim.

    He seemed to be fairly cool in his initial responses but clearly his problem was being a felon on probation while carrying an illegal firearm and being stopped by officers who knew he was a crim on probation and would likely search him and find the weapon. This didn’t allow him much leeway other than to engage the officers immediately.

    As an aside, the officer on the driver side opened the door for the crim, thus taking her left hand out of play and perhaps distracting her from reacting to the crim’s right hand dropping to his side for his draw. This was a tactical mistake on her part. With the car door opening, she should have stepped back away from the door at an angle toward her right while still being able to keep her focus on the crim. She was perhaps lulled by the crim’s apparent cooperation up to that point.

    Then there is “down” versus “down and not moving”. The former always warrants one or more followup shots, the latter only warrants one to the head if there are no witnesses or cameras (or you’re prepared to take out the witnesses as a followup.)

    However, in this incident the officer on coming around the rear of the vehicle fired instantly on seeing the crim because he couldn’t be sure the attacker was actually out of action, feigning disablement, or lying down but still able to engage. So the second shot is “justified” in any scenario and my guess is the LAPD will rule it so.

    This is an example of “tactical analysis without political correctness” provided as a public service by yours truly.

    • The male officer had lady luck on his side. He blindly fired three shots from the side of the car with the first striking the suspect in the head. Watch the video a few times. Had he not lucked out with that shot this could have gone a very different way. Glad it happened the way it did but aiming had 0 to do with the ending here, not counting the insurance shot of course…

  16. “Richard Mendoza, a gang-affiliated ex-con”

    One less criminal to house until the Leftist’s decide to slap him on the back of his hand and release him to once again prey on law abiding citizens.

    • How would a POS like the corpse become and “ex-con”?

      Apparently,”BIZ” wasn’t a very good bidnuman is all he could afford was a .380 and an Altima. A failure, go back to ole Mexico hotshot. Did LA bill Mexico for the rounds the cops used?

      • Sian, that is funny … and tragically it’s the truth! ‘Bring us your dead, your felons, your double and triple identity people! We will make YOU get at least one vote, and hopefully more!’ Sincerely, Democrats / Communists United to Destroy America

  17. For the record, ALL sworn law enforcement officers in France are armed. The Gendarmerie, Police Nationale, and Douane (Customs) carry the 9mm Sig Sauer P2022. Regarding the municipal PD some still carry a revolver (.38special) but most have a semi auto. The Police Nationale and Gendarmerie handle the serious calls, be it in cities or rural areas (Gendarmerie). Municipal PD cops in France usually handle parking violations, welfare checks, noise complaint…Towns with I think at least 2,000 souls have both the Police Nationale and City PD, with the exception of Paris where the city hall does not provide a police force.

  19. A case study in action versus reaction and why traffic stops are nasty. So many places to hide a gun, difficult to see what someone is doing. That’s not even taking into account that everyone has a 1-ton or more weapon capable of going 100mph with them.

    Hopefully that ‘little’ .380 doesn’t end her career.

  20. If that photo shows the perps gun, it is loaded with fmj bullets.
    Many authorities suggest that fmj is superior to hollow point in .380
    Since .380 is marginally powered, hollow points may expand and may not have sufficient penetration.
    This criminal had fmj and it was good enough to break her leg and put her out of the fight.
    I carry fmj (actually truncated cone) in my .380 Walther Ppk/s

    • Good choice on the tc bullets for 380. I would wholeheartedly suggest you check out Underwood Ammo. Their loadings of Lehigh Defense xtreme penetrator and xtreme defense are pretty impressive. Not cheap but not ridiculous either. They penetrates like fmj or tc bullets yet create a would profile that is better than hollow points.

  21. Well the felon was obviously a dirtbag. “Known” gangster-thugs life type. And he was obviously intent on shooting it out with the police. But, the execution shot was a bit much .My guess is if anyone of “US” were to do that to a bad guy. I believe we would be prosecuted to the max for excessive use of force against a bad guy…And We all know CommieFornia is a cesspool of Crime…And Political and police corruption…And No one in such a “official capacity” will support YOUR Constitutional-Bill of Rights there…You deserve the state government you vote for…

  23. Thank god the officer is recovering. Glad the piece of S..T is dead. Only way to treat those repeat offenders.

  25. When you’re dead you have no past, no present, and no future. That dumbass POS lying on the ground was just dead meat and didn’t feel that last bullet hit him in the head. Closed coffin funeral for him…

  26. I’m sure by the video this investigation will take at least a year to complete & waste a few $100,000’s. I mean the perp could of been upset cuz she ask if he was still on probation & that trigger him….Well I’m sure glad he “got triggered” instead of hugged by the D.A. Anyway in Calif I’m sure he would of gotten his probation extended by 6 mo’s for this if he wasn’t dead.

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