Return Fire

A paroled burglar who absconded from a Philadelphia halfway house Nov. 6 fired on police from his suburban motel room Sunday night, then apparently took his own life as a SWAT team closed in, according to police. Police in Lower Providence Township said they issued a warrant for Ricardo Soraya Noris, 48, of the 3800 block of Germantown Pike, Collegeville, after they learned he was wanted for a parole violation. When officers received a tip that Noris was staying at the Blue Eagle Motel on Ridge Pike in Collegeville, they knocked on his door and were met with "several gunshots" from inside the room.

The paroled robber is lucky the SEPTA cop was wearing a bulletproof vest, the prosecutor said. And so is the cop. If Officer Raymond Shaw hadn't been prepared, he might not be alive, said Assistant District Attorney Anthony Stefanski. The bullet fired by the pot-smoking gunman struck Shaw's vest and bounced off onto the Broad and Wyoming subway platform last Nov 1. Robert Kirby, 19, also known as Robert Young, of Wellens Avenue near 3rd Street, pleaded guilty Monday to trying to kill Shaw.

The cops could have blown the gunman away. But instead of returning fire at 80th Street and Lyons Avenue on April 18, 1998, cops kept their cool and chased the shooter into a nearby apartment and caught him, said Assistant District Attorney Lynn Nichols. Yesterday, paroled robber James Lee, 28, also known as Hakim Gamble, was convicted by a jury of attempting to murder Officer Craig Jones and simple assault charges for firing shots at two other cops and a civilian. Common Pleas Judge James J. Fitzgerald revoked bail and deferred sentencing pending a background report.

For the second year in a row, the Internal Affairs Unit is investigating shootings by Philadelphia police officers in the first minutes of a new year. In each case, police fired after responding to reports of revelers recklessly shooting their guns into the air - a dangerous tradition that seemingly won't go away despite annual appeals to stop. It may be too early to judge the appropriateness of the deadly force used in Tuesday's shootings, which left five people, including a 9-year-old boy, wounded.

Police charged a 23-year-old Roxborough man with several counts of assault yesterday after an early-morning shooting in which an officer was slightly wounded, a police spokesman said. Another officer also was slightly injured in the incident. Police said Officer Leonard Bowen, 41, of the Fifth Police District, was grazed by one of seven bullets fired at him and another officer, Caroline Lawson, 26, as they chased a man in the 400 block of Roxborough Avenue about 2:30 yesterday morning.

TRUMANN, Ark. - Wounded in the neck and scrambling away from a gunman, a young Arkansas police officer managed to shove his sergeant out of harm's way before dying in a shootout, witnesses said yesterday. Two of the people who were in a car pulled over by Officer Jonathan Schmidt said the policeman died a hero - saving the life of Sgt. Corey Overstreet before taking on suspect Jerry Lard in a late-night gunbattle. "So many shots you can't even count," said April Swanner, 30, a passenger in the car and a high-school classmate of the fallen officer.

3 killed in Calif.; gunman dies PORTERVILLE, Calif. - A man shot three people to death and wounded another on a California Indian reservation, and was fatally wounded himself hours later in an exchange of gunfire with sheriff's deputies as he tried to flee in a vehicle, authorities said Sunday. Officials said Hector Celaya, 31, also shot his two daughters, ages 5 and 8, who were with him when he was apprehended about 2 a.m. One had life-threatening injuries and the other was less seriously hurt.

Alan Caruba is the founder of The National Anxiety Center The killings on the Virginia Tech campus, the worst such rampage in our history, might have been mitigated if just one member of the faculty or a student had the means to return fire. I have owned guns for decades. On rare occasions, I have had to "show" one of my guns to people with bad intentions. Not surprisingly, they changed their plans to take my money and do me harm. The Virginia Tech killings confirm the value of empowering ordinary citizens to carry concealed weapons.

THEY LINED up the heroes along a wall to wait for the handshake some of them nearly died earning. A voice called their names, and they took turns stepping onto the stage at Fraternal Order of Police Hall for the 90 seconds of recognition we give a cop who risks his life to save someone else's. It's just enough time for Police Commissioner Sylvester Johnson, Managing Director Estelle Richman and their district commanders to surround the beaming hero for a quick photo holding up the unframed citation that will go into his or her personnel folder.

Cops fatally shot robbery suspect Two police officers in Overbrook late Thursday night narrowly missed being shot when authorities say a man with a lengthy criminal record opened fire on them, prompting them to return fire and fatally shoot the 32-year-old man, police said. Police on Friday identified the man as William Washington, of Broad Street near Poplar in North Philadelphia. Police spokesman Lt. John Stanford cops were on patrol near 56th Street and Lebanon Avenue due to an increase of burglaries in the area when they spotted Washington about 10:30 p.m. carrying a bag as he was exiting an alley between Lebanon Avenue and Diamond Street.

POLICE SHOT a 31-year-old man who allegedly fired at an officer late Thursday night in West Philadelphia. Police said the officer, whom they did not name, was investigating a robbery of a 7-Eleven near 58th and Whitby just before midnight. He spotted a man who fit the description of one of the thieves near the corner of 58th and Baltimore. When the officer approached and attempted to pat him down, the man pulled away from the officer and pulled out a handgun, firing twice, police said.

Cops fatally shot robbery suspect Two police officers in Overbrook late Thursday night narrowly missed being shot when authorities say a man with a lengthy criminal record opened fire on them, prompting them to return fire and fatally shoot the 32-year-old man, police said. Police on Friday identified the man as William Washington, of Broad Street near Poplar in North Philadelphia. Police spokesman Lt. John Stanford cops were on patrol near 56th Street and Lebanon Avenue due to an increase of burglaries in the area when they spotted Washington about 10:30 p.m. carrying a bag as he was exiting an alley between Lebanon Avenue and Diamond Street.

3 killed in Calif.; gunman dies PORTERVILLE, Calif. - A man shot three people to death and wounded another on a California Indian reservation, and was fatally wounded himself hours later in an exchange of gunfire with sheriff's deputies as he tried to flee in a vehicle, authorities said Sunday. Officials said Hector Celaya, 31, also shot his two daughters, ages 5 and 8, who were with him when he was apprehended about 2 a.m. One had life-threatening injuries and the other was less seriously hurt.

PHOENIX - The U.S. Border Patrol agent killed last week in a shooting in southern Arizona apparently had opened fire on two fellow agents, thinking that they were armed smugglers, and was killed when they returned fire, the head of the Border Patrol agents' union said Sunday. The two sets of agents approached an area where a sensor had been activated from different directions early Tuesday and encountered each other in an area of heavy brush, National Border Patrol Council president George McCubbin said.

I SHOT A MAN in the head Tuesday. I didn't realize how easy it could be, or how little time I'd have to think about it. I never thought of what might happen to him or the consequences I would face. I couldn't. My adrenaline had taken hold, and all I could think of was suppressing the fear and surviving — surviving the two shots he'd fired at my bulletproof vest and the car stop that had gotten me into this mess, and then making sure he didn't shoot anyone else. It was unreal.

Early on a May morning two years ago, 90 U.S. Army and Afghan troops infiltrated a remote village east of Kabul in search of weapons caches. They expected, at worst, a firefight with 15 Taliban. But the patrol suddenly was scrambling, desperate for cover, when dawn brought a fusillade by upward of 100 insurgents. Whistling rounds fountained the dirt and shattered rocks. Machine-gun fire from 100-foot cliffs trapped the unit in withering cross fire. Within 45 minutes, two Afghan soldiers were dead and three critically wounded.

The owner of a North Philadelphia fish-tank store was shot in the leg during a robbery about 5:45 p.m. Saturday, police said. He was being treated at Temple University Hospital. He told authorities that two men entered the store in the 3000 block of North Fifth Street in an attempt to rob it. Though wounded, he returned fire and may have struck one of the men, he told police. - Jane M. Von Bergen  

ISLAMABAD - Pakistan's top military commander has issued orders to the country's troops to return fire should they come under attack again from U.S.-led coalition forces, a move that is likely to increase tensions after an American-led air raid on two border outposts last week killed 24 Pakistani soldiers. Gen. Ashfaq Parvez Kayani, Pakistan's army chief, issued the order in a letter to his troops that set out the rules of engagement against any "aggressor. " The new orders came as Pakistan and U.S. officials continued to trade conflicting accounts of what happened in the incident, which is thought to have occurred shortly after midnight last Saturday.

A paroled burglar who absconded from a Philadelphia halfway house Nov. 6 fired on police from his suburban motel room Sunday night, then apparently took his own life as a SWAT team closed in, according to police. Police in Lower Providence Township said they issued a warrant for Ricardo Soraya Noris, 48, of the 3800 block of Germantown Pike, Collegeville, after they learned he was wanted for a parole violation. When officers received a tip that Noris was staying at the Blue Eagle Motel on Ridge Pike in Collegeville, they knocked on his door and were met with "several gunshots" from inside the room.

Officials are not yet saying if arson was the cause of a second major Camden fire in as many days that tore through an old commercial building Saturday morning. Firefighters were still dousing "hot spots" before noon. A Camden County official said the city fire department was dispatched at 2:26 a.m. to fight a blaze on the 400 block of Winslow Street at the Howland Croft building, which took up most of the street. The fire was brought under control at 6 a.m., officials said. However, the fire grew to eight alarms at the old garment factory, which officials said had been used only for storage for a number of years.