Man Shot, Wounded After Stop by CHP

An unidentified man was shot and wounded Monday after he allegedly waved a handgun at two California Highway Patrol officers during an early morning traffic stop on the Santa Ana Freeway, police said.

The victim, whose identity was withheld, was treated Monday at UCI Medical Center in Orange for multiple, non-life-threatening gunshot wounds, said police Sgt. Joe Vargas. No one else was injured in the 2:15 a.m. confrontation on a freeway shoulder south of Harbor Boulevard.

“It’s an officer’s worst nightmare,” Vargas said. “You pull over someone on a routine traffic stop and they get out of their car and point a gun at you and you have no idea why and you don’t see it coming.”

It was not clear why officers pulled over the two-door, white Nissan Sentra as it headed south, Vargas said. Citing the pending investigation, the CHP declined to comment on the case.

When the driver jumped from the car with a gun, the officers retreated behind their patrol car and opened fire, Vargas said.

The suspect told police his name, but Vargas said it was being withheld until investigators could confirm it via fingerprint records. “And they can’t get fingerprints yet because his hands are bandaged,” Vargas said.

The suspect’s 1988 Nissan is registered to Alfonso and Felipe Lopez, according to state records, and Vargas said there is no record of the car being reported stolen.

Vargas said the name given by the injured man matches one of the registered owners, but he declined to elaborate.

The shooting was being investigated Monday by Anaheim police, the CHP and the Orange County district attorney’s office, which investigates all officer-involved shootings in the county.

“We’ll be looking for contraband, controlled substances, anything that might suggest why this happened,” Vargas said.

“We don’t know if he was under the influence, or if he just had a fight with his wife or what. People in their right minds don’t just pull a gun on officers.”