Archives: Fallen Officers

David L. Worcester

Officer David L. Worcester was appointed to the Oakland Police Department in February 1949. He was assigned to the Traffic Bureau as a motorcycle patrolman in June 1952.

Just prior to getting off duty on July 8, 1953, Worcester and three other motorcycle officers were assigned to assist at a fire scene. Worcester and Officer LeRoy Perry left City Hall and drove their motorcycles east. As they made the loop on the 12th Street Dam and onto E 14th Street, Worcester crossed over the centerline. He struck the left front of a westbound vehicle. His motorcycle spun around and Perry’s motorcycle struck him. Worcester was thrown 25 feet and struck his head on the pavement. He died shortly after arrival at Merritt Hospital of a fractured skull. Perry suffered from minor wounds and shock.

Worcester, 29, was survived by his wife and two children.

Thomas E. Millet

On June 16, 1953, Officer Millet was fatally injured at the police shooting range when another officer’s weapon accidentally discharged.

John W. Armatoski

Officer John W. Armatoski was on an enforcement stop eastbound on U.S. Highway 66 west of Needles. After he completed the traffic citation, Armatoski was approaching the violator’s car on the left side when an intoxicated motorist, driving a stolen station wagon, sideswiped the parked vehicle and struck Annatoski. The patrol officer was killed instantly. Armatoski had been a member of the CHP for five years.

Roland Barbeau

Sheriff’s Captain Roland Barbeau died from injuries he suffered when his patrol car’s tire blew out which caused the patrol car to go off the road 20 miles north of Mojave. The driver, Lt. Charles Dewey, and two other passengers, (prisoners) escaped injury.

Barbeau, 46, a veteran officer and chief of the Identification bureau, was thrown from the car as it rolled off US 6 near Red Rock Canyon. The two prisoners, suffering only cuts and bruises, administered first aid to the two officers, they stopped a passing motorist to get help.

A brain specialist was rushed from Fresno to Bakersfield for emergency surgery, but the deputy failed to respond.

Barbeau and Dewey were returning to Bakersfield from Ridgecrest and Inyokern with two prisoners. Dewey managed to keep the car on the road until after it had passed a strip bordered by steep ravines. The vehicle then overturned, throwing Barbeau from the car. The other remained inside until after the car came to a stop. The prisoners, both of Glendale, expressed great admiration for the excellent control Dewey had over the car. “Otherwise,” one prisoner said, “we would have all been at the bottom of the canyon.”

Dewey and the two prisoners were treated and released from Kern General Hospital less than four hours later.

Barbeau had been with the Sheriff’s Department for 18 years.

Gordon G. French

Gordon G. French was a forty-eight year old Police Officer for the City of Laguna Beach who was murdered on February 13, 1953. Officer French was unarmed and taken hostage by an escaping felon from the Laguna Beach police department. He was shot while attempting to overpower and subdue the suspect. The suspect subsequently committed suicide in the City of San Clemente.

Ralph Vargas

Officer Ralph A. Vargas was patrolling in a residential area when his patrol motorcycle collided with an automobile that abruptly made a left turn in front of his motorcycle. Vargas had no time to apply his brakes and crashed into the vehicle. The 26-year-old officer died six hours after the accident. Vargas had joined the Patrol just two-and-a-half years earlier.