Philadelphia Police Officer Critically Wounded Trying to Break Up School Fight

By Ellie Rushing

Source The Philadelphia Inquirer

A Philadelphia police officer was critically wounded Wednesday afternoon after he was shot in the stomach while attempting to break up a fight outside Overbrook High School, police said.

Shortly after school dismissed around 2:30 p.m., Police Commissioner Kevin Bethel said, multiple fights erupted and spilled onto the sidewalk across the street, near 59th and West Oxford Streets. Officers stationed outside the school called for backup as the conflict grew, he said.

As students clashed, he said, a 30-year-old man arrived, armed with a Ruger-57 pistol. Officers were attempting to break up one of the fights, he said, when a single shot — a rifle round — was fired from the gun. The bullet ricocheted off the ground and up into the officer's abdomen, wedging beneath his bulletproof vest and striking him in the stomach, the commissioner said.

The officer, a 26-year-old who had been on the force for only a year, did not immediately realize he had been shot, Bethel said. Within minutes, fellow officers rushed him to Penn Presbyterian Medical Center, where he was conscious but remained in critical condition, the commissioner said.

Bethel said the 30-year-old, who they believe fired the gun, was in custody, and a weapon was recovered. Police did not release the man's name.

"For an adult to come with a weapon that could kill — easily kill — my officers, I mean, it makes absolutely no sense," Bethel said with frustration.

"You're a damn adult. You're supposed to know better. You're supposed to come in and de-escalate, not escalate," he said. "You're a coward."

In a letter to Overbrook High families, the School District of Philadelphia said that the fight involved multiple "students and members of the community," and that the officer was wounded after a "community member" fired a gun. No students were injured, the district said.

Video captured by a bystander at the scene showed over a dozen young people and police crowded in the street in front of a corner deli, across from the school. The video appeared to show several young men fighting, with officers attempting to pull them apart, when suddenly there was a loud pop. Some people started to scream and run.

The wounded officer was not visible in the footage.

Bethel, alongside Mayor Cherelle L. Parker and other city leaders, had rushed to the scene from a luncheon with the families of police officers and firefighters who died in the line of duty over time. Officials had spent the morning with those first responders' loved ones, they said, honoring their lives and sacrifice, when they got the call that another officer had been shot.

"It can be too easy to take for granted the sacrifice the men and women who put their lives on the line on a daily basis for us," Parker said Wednesday. "Today and tonight and tomorrow, Philadelphia, I am asking you to say a prayer for this officer and his family, as well as everyone who puts on a uniform to protect and serve."

Roosevelt Poplar, president of the Fraternal Order of Police Lodge #5, said he and the members of his board were sending the officer "heartfelt wishes for a swift and full recovery."

Bethel, in an emotional speech outside the hospital as the officer was rushed into surgery, spoke further of that dedication and sacrifice, and of "the tenacity, the restraint, the understanding in the moment" that he said officers displayed at the scene of Wednesday's shooting. Even amid a brawl, he said, they were able to protect kids, identify the shooter and take him into custody, and rush their colleague to the hospital.

"That is the work that people just brush across. ... This is the work they do," he said. "Honor them. Honor them."

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