Jolie Rouge
08-29-2006, 09:10 PM
One dead, at least 14 hurt in hit-and-run rampage
By Leslie Griffy, Julie Sevrens Lyons, Therese Poletti, Mary Anne Ostrom, James Hohmann and Sean Webby
Mercury News
One man has died and at least 14 people were injured when a Fremont man purposefully drove his sport-utility vehicle onto sidewalks and crosswalks in San Francisco and Fremont today, according to San Francisco police.
The victims appear to include a Fremont man, a 78-year-old man who was using a cane to cross the street when he was struck, and a woman in her 70s. Earlier reports that a child was injured was incorrect.
``It's one of the craziest things I've seen in my years on the force,'' said San Francisco police Sgt. Neville Gittens. ``This individual was driving around the city mowing people down.''
The driver was in police custody. His name was not immediately released, but Department of Motor Vehicles records show the license plate on the SUV is registered to Omeed A. Popal of Fremont.
An aide to San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom who spoke on condition of anonymity because the matter was under investigation said Popal was the suspect in custody. He was injured and in stable condition, the aide said.
Newsom described the suspect as a ``relatively young man.''
There may be additional victims who may have gone to the hospital without the assistance of an ambulance, Gittens said.
Gittens said emergency crews took 13 people to hospitals. Three of the people injured in San Francisco have ``life-threatening injuries,'' he said.
San Francisco General Hospital received the bulk of the known victims, with seven being tended to in the trauma center there. The youngest is 18 and the oldest is 78, according to hospital spokesman Anson Moon. The other five at that hospital are between the ages of 40 and 60. Four of the patients are men and three are women. Some have been released. One patient is in critical condition.
``It's pretty chaotic,'' Moon said.
One of the victims spoke briefly to reporters as he left San Francisco General Hospital.
``A car came after me, I'm lucky to be alive,'' said the young man, who declined to give his name. ``Life is good.''
Two men and one woman, all in there early 20s, were taken to St. Francis Hospital, where they were being treated for abrasions. A fourth victim, a man in his 30s, checked himself into St. Francis.
Two other patients, identified as elderly males, were taken to California Pacific Medical Center, and were listed in stable condition.
Another injured patient was taken to St. Mary's Medical Center. That hospital would not divulge any information about the patient's condition.
Fremont police told KCBS this afternoon that they have interviewed the suspect's family.
The spree apparently began around noon in Fremont, where the driver hit an unidentified man walking north on Fremont Boulevard just past Decoto Road, according to Fremont police Detective Bill Veteran.
The pedestrian, a 54-year-old Fremont man, was walking in a bicycle lane, Fremont Sgt. Jeff Swadener said. Witnesses told police a black SUV was driving north on Decoto Road in the second lane from the left at a high speed when he pulled into the bicycle lane and hit the man. The man flipped up onto the windshield and was thrown several feet into a nearby field, Swadener said. He was pronounced dead at the scene.
Witnesses told police the SUV had extensive damage to its front after hitting the pedestrian, but the driver continued north without stopping.
The vehicle was going north on Fremont Boulevard just past Decoto Road when it swerved from the middle lane, veered off the street and hit a pedestrian who was walking north in the bicycle lane, Veteran said. It then continued north on Fremont without stopping.
The driver then crossed the bay into San Francisco, where he injured at least 13 people at 12 locations spanning several neighborhoods starting around 12:45, Gittens said.
The suspect drove through the Laurel Heights district which is especially busy with children during the day and allegedly hit people in four locations on California Street.
Margarita Paloma, who lives in San Francisco and works as a baby nurse, was walking in Laurel Village at around 1 p.m. when a black SUV roared through a red light at the intersection of California and Laurel Streets, running down a woman crossing the street.
``It was going too fast -- the noise of the car was so strange, like a big roar,'' Paloma said. ``The lady was unconscious. She had blood in her hair, and her leg was a mess. People ran to help her -- no one could believe it.''
Linda Tuggle, a hair stylist at the Lotte Beauty Salon on Fillmore Avenue between Sutter and Bush streets , said she heard a lot of noise, looked up and saw a black SUV drove onto the sidewalk. Then the SUV drove out of her view and she heard screaming. Tuggle said a police officer told her that the SUV hit a woman in her 70s. Hours later a towel was covering a splotch of blood on the sidewalk.
Police report the driver hit at least three people on Fillmore and one on Sutter.
The driver looked clean-cut, like he worked in the financial district. And ``he was looking really pissed off,'' she said.
Noel Karsha, an owner of King of Falafil on the corner of Bush and Divisidero, heard what she thought was just another minor traffic accident. She walked out of her small restaurant to see two young women laying in the street near the intersection.
One young woman was crying with an apparent injury to her legs. Another was sitting. It was then that Karsha and other witnesses said they saw the dark SUV that had struck the women drive past again. They said they knew it was the car involved because of its smashed windshield and crumpled front bumper. They could not describe the driver.
Some of the witnesses said the car was speeding. Others said it was driving at a normal rate of speed.
Joe Lee, an employee F. Lorano and Son, an auto repair shop near the intersection, said he also saw the aftermath of the hit-and-run. He said ``it didn't look like he was aiming for cars. It looked like he was aiming for people.''
The driver allegedly hit pedestrians at at least 12 locations within San Francisco.
The SUV finally came to rest in the city's Richmond district, where police cars boxed in the black Honda Pilot and took the driver into custody.
http://www.mercurynews.com/mld/mercurynews...ws/15391458.htm
San Fran car rampage ends at Jewish Community Center
Omeed Aziz Popal, 29, was arrested for a San Francisco-area hit-and-run spree that killed one and injured 14 others. SF Chronicle reporting: http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?...BAGAEKRCO55.DTL
San Francisco police spokesman Sgt. Neville Gittens said the attacks in the city occurred at 12 locations over a 20-minute period.
"The hits were intentional,'' he said, noting that police are treating them as assaults.
Gittens had no information about a possible motive.
Popal was arrested after patrol cars boxed in his black Honda SUV, its windshield and right front headlight smashed, outside a Walgreens store on Spruce Street between California and Mayfair in the Laurel Heights area.
A dental office manager, who identified herself only as Kira, watched from a second-floor window as police dragged the driver out of his vehicle. "He was absolutely indifferent, no fear, no expression,'' she said. "He was like a zombie.''
Architect Jeremy Warms also saw police pull Popal out of the SUV and sit him down on the curb. "He looked calm and pretty clean-cut, like a normal guy,'' Warms said. "He sat on the pavement for a good 25 minutes. I don't think anyone said anything to him. They put him in a police car and took him away.''
This evening, it was unclear exactly how many people had been injured, and in what order the incidents occurred. The police reported the following injuries:
-- Two people, one of them a child, were seriously injured on the 3500 block of California Street in Laurel Heights.
-- Three people were hit at California and Fillmore streets. Witnesses said they included a man with a broken hip and a woman with a gashed head.
-- Two people were seriously hurt at Bush and Pierce streets.
-- One person was seriously injured at Bush and Buchanan streets.
-- One person suffered minor injuries in an incident at 1850 Fillmore St.
-- Two other people suffered minor injuries when they were hit at Pine at Divisadero streets.
-- Two people were hit and suffered minor injuries at Divisadero and Bush streets.
Here's the part that caught my eye, a detail I haven't seen noted anywhere else yet (update: LGF noticed, too): http://littlegreenfootballs.com/weblog/?en..._Francisco&only
The SUV struck two people in front of the Jewish Community Center of San Francisco on California Street, a few blocks from where the rampage ended.
Blood covered the sidewalk in front of the center's gift store entrance, and 50 feet farther down the sidewalk lay a mangled bicycle.
Security cameras in front of the center captured images of the incident, which happened at 1:12 p.m., according to Aaron Rosenthal, spokesman for the community center.
Stay tuned.
Will MSM cover ????
By Leslie Griffy, Julie Sevrens Lyons, Therese Poletti, Mary Anne Ostrom, James Hohmann and Sean Webby
Mercury News
One man has died and at least 14 people were injured when a Fremont man purposefully drove his sport-utility vehicle onto sidewalks and crosswalks in San Francisco and Fremont today, according to San Francisco police.
The victims appear to include a Fremont man, a 78-year-old man who was using a cane to cross the street when he was struck, and a woman in her 70s. Earlier reports that a child was injured was incorrect.
``It's one of the craziest things I've seen in my years on the force,'' said San Francisco police Sgt. Neville Gittens. ``This individual was driving around the city mowing people down.''
The driver was in police custody. His name was not immediately released, but Department of Motor Vehicles records show the license plate on the SUV is registered to Omeed A. Popal of Fremont.
An aide to San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom who spoke on condition of anonymity because the matter was under investigation said Popal was the suspect in custody. He was injured and in stable condition, the aide said.
Newsom described the suspect as a ``relatively young man.''
There may be additional victims who may have gone to the hospital without the assistance of an ambulance, Gittens said.
Gittens said emergency crews took 13 people to hospitals. Three of the people injured in San Francisco have ``life-threatening injuries,'' he said.
San Francisco General Hospital received the bulk of the known victims, with seven being tended to in the trauma center there. The youngest is 18 and the oldest is 78, according to hospital spokesman Anson Moon. The other five at that hospital are between the ages of 40 and 60. Four of the patients are men and three are women. Some have been released. One patient is in critical condition.
``It's pretty chaotic,'' Moon said.
One of the victims spoke briefly to reporters as he left San Francisco General Hospital.
``A car came after me, I'm lucky to be alive,'' said the young man, who declined to give his name. ``Life is good.''
Two men and one woman, all in there early 20s, were taken to St. Francis Hospital, where they were being treated for abrasions. A fourth victim, a man in his 30s, checked himself into St. Francis.
Two other patients, identified as elderly males, were taken to California Pacific Medical Center, and were listed in stable condition.
Another injured patient was taken to St. Mary's Medical Center. That hospital would not divulge any information about the patient's condition.
Fremont police told KCBS this afternoon that they have interviewed the suspect's family.
The spree apparently began around noon in Fremont, where the driver hit an unidentified man walking north on Fremont Boulevard just past Decoto Road, according to Fremont police Detective Bill Veteran.
The pedestrian, a 54-year-old Fremont man, was walking in a bicycle lane, Fremont Sgt. Jeff Swadener said. Witnesses told police a black SUV was driving north on Decoto Road in the second lane from the left at a high speed when he pulled into the bicycle lane and hit the man. The man flipped up onto the windshield and was thrown several feet into a nearby field, Swadener said. He was pronounced dead at the scene.
Witnesses told police the SUV had extensive damage to its front after hitting the pedestrian, but the driver continued north without stopping.
The vehicle was going north on Fremont Boulevard just past Decoto Road when it swerved from the middle lane, veered off the street and hit a pedestrian who was walking north in the bicycle lane, Veteran said. It then continued north on Fremont without stopping.
The driver then crossed the bay into San Francisco, where he injured at least 13 people at 12 locations spanning several neighborhoods starting around 12:45, Gittens said.
The suspect drove through the Laurel Heights district which is especially busy with children during the day and allegedly hit people in four locations on California Street.
Margarita Paloma, who lives in San Francisco and works as a baby nurse, was walking in Laurel Village at around 1 p.m. when a black SUV roared through a red light at the intersection of California and Laurel Streets, running down a woman crossing the street.
``It was going too fast -- the noise of the car was so strange, like a big roar,'' Paloma said. ``The lady was unconscious. She had blood in her hair, and her leg was a mess. People ran to help her -- no one could believe it.''
Linda Tuggle, a hair stylist at the Lotte Beauty Salon on Fillmore Avenue between Sutter and Bush streets , said she heard a lot of noise, looked up and saw a black SUV drove onto the sidewalk. Then the SUV drove out of her view and she heard screaming. Tuggle said a police officer told her that the SUV hit a woman in her 70s. Hours later a towel was covering a splotch of blood on the sidewalk.
Police report the driver hit at least three people on Fillmore and one on Sutter.
The driver looked clean-cut, like he worked in the financial district. And ``he was looking really pissed off,'' she said.
Noel Karsha, an owner of King of Falafil on the corner of Bush and Divisidero, heard what she thought was just another minor traffic accident. She walked out of her small restaurant to see two young women laying in the street near the intersection.
One young woman was crying with an apparent injury to her legs. Another was sitting. It was then that Karsha and other witnesses said they saw the dark SUV that had struck the women drive past again. They said they knew it was the car involved because of its smashed windshield and crumpled front bumper. They could not describe the driver.
Some of the witnesses said the car was speeding. Others said it was driving at a normal rate of speed.
Joe Lee, an employee F. Lorano and Son, an auto repair shop near the intersection, said he also saw the aftermath of the hit-and-run. He said ``it didn't look like he was aiming for cars. It looked like he was aiming for people.''
The driver allegedly hit pedestrians at at least 12 locations within San Francisco.
The SUV finally came to rest in the city's Richmond district, where police cars boxed in the black Honda Pilot and took the driver into custody.
http://www.mercurynews.com/mld/mercurynews...ws/15391458.htm
San Fran car rampage ends at Jewish Community Center
Omeed Aziz Popal, 29, was arrested for a San Francisco-area hit-and-run spree that killed one and injured 14 others. SF Chronicle reporting: http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?...BAGAEKRCO55.DTL
San Francisco police spokesman Sgt. Neville Gittens said the attacks in the city occurred at 12 locations over a 20-minute period.
"The hits were intentional,'' he said, noting that police are treating them as assaults.
Gittens had no information about a possible motive.
Popal was arrested after patrol cars boxed in his black Honda SUV, its windshield and right front headlight smashed, outside a Walgreens store on Spruce Street between California and Mayfair in the Laurel Heights area.
A dental office manager, who identified herself only as Kira, watched from a second-floor window as police dragged the driver out of his vehicle. "He was absolutely indifferent, no fear, no expression,'' she said. "He was like a zombie.''
Architect Jeremy Warms also saw police pull Popal out of the SUV and sit him down on the curb. "He looked calm and pretty clean-cut, like a normal guy,'' Warms said. "He sat on the pavement for a good 25 minutes. I don't think anyone said anything to him. They put him in a police car and took him away.''
This evening, it was unclear exactly how many people had been injured, and in what order the incidents occurred. The police reported the following injuries:
-- Two people, one of them a child, were seriously injured on the 3500 block of California Street in Laurel Heights.
-- Three people were hit at California and Fillmore streets. Witnesses said they included a man with a broken hip and a woman with a gashed head.
-- Two people were seriously hurt at Bush and Pierce streets.
-- One person was seriously injured at Bush and Buchanan streets.
-- One person suffered minor injuries in an incident at 1850 Fillmore St.
-- Two other people suffered minor injuries when they were hit at Pine at Divisadero streets.
-- Two people were hit and suffered minor injuries at Divisadero and Bush streets.
Here's the part that caught my eye, a detail I haven't seen noted anywhere else yet (update: LGF noticed, too): http://littlegreenfootballs.com/weblog/?en..._Francisco&only
The SUV struck two people in front of the Jewish Community Center of San Francisco on California Street, a few blocks from where the rampage ended.
Blood covered the sidewalk in front of the center's gift store entrance, and 50 feet farther down the sidewalk lay a mangled bicycle.
Security cameras in front of the center captured images of the incident, which happened at 1:12 p.m., according to Aaron Rosenthal, spokesman for the community center.
Stay tuned.
Will MSM cover ????