Detective Monty Conley died August 5, 1985, as a result of a traffic accident while investigating a narcotic’s case. Also killed was his partner, Detective Joseph Landin. A driver ran a stop sign and slammed into the deputies’ patrol unit on the Highway 99 and Avenue 120 off ramp.

The driver was subsequently sentenced to five years, four months in prison on the conviction of vehicular manslaughter with gross negligence.

The deputies were members of the Tulare County Sheriff’s Narcotic’s Task Force. Prior to joining the Department, Conley worked as a patrol officer for Woodlake Police Department from 1972 to 1973.

Conley joined the Sheriff’s Department in 1973. He worked in various divisions, most recently serving as assistant commander of the narcotics division. He was voted Officer of The Year by the Visalia Optimists Club this spring and was a member of the California Narcotics Task Force.

Conley was born in Shamrock, Texas, and moved to Woodlake in 1955. He attended Woodlake High School and College of the Sequoias and became Woodlake’s youngest police officer at age 19.

He lived in Woodlake with is wife, Rosalie, and their 7-year-old son, Matthew Earl.

Detective Joseph Landin died August 5, 1985, as a result of a traffic accident while investigating a narcotic’s case. Also killed was his partner, Detective Monty Conley. A driver ran a stop sign and slammed into the deputies’ patrol unit on the Highway 99 and Avenue 120 off ramp.

The driver was subsequently sentenced to five years, four months in prison on the conviction of vehicular manslaughter with gross negligence.

The deputies were members of the Tulare County Sheriff’s Narcotic’s Task Force.

Prior to joining the Department in 1981, Landin was a patrol officer for the Woodlake Police Department from 1974 to 1981.

Landin, 34, lived in Woodlake at the time of his death. He left a wife, Betty, and three small children.

Landin joined the Sheriff’s Department in 1981 after six years as a Woodlake police officer. He was a 1968 graduate of Woodlake High School and also graduated from College of the Sequoias and the Tulare-Kings County Law Enforcement Academy.

With the department, Landin served in several divisions including the Sheriff’s Tactical Enforcement Patrol, which patrols high-crime areas and the narcotics division.

He was secretary and current vice president of the Latino Peace Officers Association and a member of the Woodlake branch of the Veterans of Foreign Wars and the Tulare County Sheriff’s Association.

A native of Lamesa, Texas, Landin moved to Woodlake in 1965 and settled there with his wife, Bette, and three young children – sons Joseph and Christopher and daughter Monica.

The path of a dedicated San Jose police officer, Henry I. Bunch, and a 42-year-old transient crossed Monday, July 29, ending in sudden death for both of them.

Officer Bunch, 33, was shot in the head while preparing to administer a blood-alcohol test to Robert Ordonez who grabbed the officer’s 41-magnum revolver and fired one shot.

The episode occurred as Bunch and Ordonez were alone in a locked room of the Alcohol Investigation Bureau.

Bunch and his partner, Officer Richard Bridges, had arrested and handcuffed Ordonez after finding him slumped over the wheel of a parked car.

Bridges stated that he left Bunch with Ordonez and went to put his own pistol in a locker, which is department policy. He heard a shot and ran back to the booking room. Upon entering he was assaulted by Ordonez with Bunch’s gun. Bridges managed to wrestle the gun away. Two shots were fired, with the second one hitting the transient in the head.

Bridges then pushed an alarm button to summon help. Both Bunch and Ordonez were pronounced dead at the scene.

Assistant Police Chief Stan Horton said Bunch apparently made a fatal mistake when he failed to put his gun away before removing the suspect’s handcuffs in preparation for the blood-alcohol test.

“The policy . . . is to secure the gun first,” Horton said. Keeping a gun at hand, even when dealing with a belligerent suspect, merely increases the danger, he added.

Bunch, a five-year veteran of the force, had won praise from citizens and commendations from the department. He was an “outstanding” officer, according to his superiors.

“My guess is that he merely forgot to put his gun away,” said patrol division chief Larry Stuefloten. “Sometimes the greatest danger in this job is the routine (situation).”

Bunch was the first San Jose officer in 15 years to be shot to death in the line of duty.

Officer Bunch joined the San Jose Police Department in 1980. Previous service includes six years as a police officer in Daly City, and three years as a cadet/dispatcher in Corte Madera. He is survived by his wife and his 6-year-old daughter by a previous marriage and two stepchildren, ages 3 and 4.

Funeral services were held on Thursday, Aug. 1, at the First Baptist Church of San Jose followed by interment at the Oak Hill Cemetery.

Mrs. Bunch wrote the following letter after her husband’s death:

TO ALL POLICE OFFICERS EVERYWHERE:

Have courage and strength. Continue to believe in the rightness of your position in life. Live life as keepers of peace and love each other and your families.

Thank you all, for sharing your strength and convictions with me on this dark day. Each of you brought me a little light, a lot of respect and took away a great degree of loneliness.
Sincerely,
Nancy Bunch

CPO H.D. “Hal” Burchfield, Correctional Sergeant, San Quentin, was murdered by a convict while on duty June 8, 1985.

Burchfield had worked the profession for more than a decade serving at several correctional prisons. He cared about this group of peace officers and his commitment to its professionalization will not be forgotten.

He was a correctional peace officer, who started his career on October 13, 1974, at Folsom State Prison as a Correctional Officer. He transferred to Sierra Conservation Center as a Correctional Program Supervisor 1. He was then promoted to San Quentin as a Correctional Sergeant on July 14, 1983.

Burchfield is survived by his wife, Barbara, and five children ranging in ages from 2 to 17 years old.

Deputy Clifford E. Sanchez was shot and killed Saturday, April 6, 1985, during a robbery in a parking lot behind a cocktail lounge, police said.

Offices were looking for two men in the killing of Sanchez, 28, who was shot three times in the head and the torso. The gunmen escaped with Sanchez’s revolver, Deputy Mario Lupercio said.

“The victim was robbed and shot to death while sitting with a female companion in the victim’s pickup truck,” a sheriff’s statement said.

Sgt. Wayne Smith denied reports that the gunman shot Sanchez after he opened his wallet and realized Sanchez was a law enforcement officer.

“From our interviews, we don’t know if they saw his ID or not,” Smith said. Sanchez had his wallet with him, but it was not found.

The woman was not hurt.

Christopher Caldwell, 18, and Cedric Davis, 21, were arrested and charged in the incident.

Sanchez of Rialto had been with the Sheriff’s Department six years, assigned since October 1981 to the central jail division. He previously worked in the Fontana substation and at the Glen Helen Rehabilitation Center.

Sanchez is survived by his parents, Larry and Joan Sanchez; and sons, Larry and Anthony. Sanchez’s father is an 18-year veteran of the California Highway Patrol.

Officer David W. Copleman was killed during the pursuit of a speeding motorcyclist on State Route 126 in east Ventura County. Copleman initiated the pursuit of a speeding motorcycle and was joined by two Ventura sheriff’s units and a Fillmore P.D. unit. All four law enforcement units had lights and sirens activated when an oncoming van swerved into opposing traffic lanes to avoid rear-ending another vehicle and struck the CHP unit head-on. Copleman, 27, died at the scene and the van occupants sustained major injuries. The speeding motorcyclist was stopped and arrested by Fillmore police on suspicion of vehicular man slaughter and reckless driving causing injury.

After graduating from the CHP Academy, Copleman served in the Ventura area. He had been with the department for two and a half years.

Funeral services were conducted April 12 at Joshua Memorial Cemetery.

Copleman is survived by his wife, Arlene, and children, LaJetta, 9, and Brandon, 4.

Police Chief Bill Kolender told an overflow crowd at the First United Methodist Church that “once again I must try to find words that can make sense out of a senseless situation.”

Addressing survivors of the family of slain police Agent Thomas Edward Riggs, 27, Kolender, in his eulogy, said: “Six months ago in this church I promised the family of Tom Riggs, as we gathered to honor the memory of his brother-in-law, Tim Ruopp, that they would never have to face a greater pain in their lives than the pain they were feeling at Tim’s loss.

“But that turned out to be a promise that could not be kept, and today we are mourning the death of Tom.”

The funeral procession for Riggs began at 8 a.m. when hundreds of peace officers from across the country amassed at San Diego Jack Murphy Stadium.

Local, state, and federal law enforcement officers, as well as military personnel, were attired in dress uniforms. Kolender led the procession into the church for the 11 a.m. service after meeting a motorcade that stretched a mile, from the stadium to the church on Camino del Rio South in Mission Valley.

Riggs, who was killed during a melee in Encanto Sunday, March 31, was the 26th San Diego police officer killed in the line of duty since 1933.

The Rev. H.W. Mitschke, pastor of Our Redeemer Lutheran Church in Southeast San Diego and a police chaplain, conducted the service for Riggs in the crowded church.

The chief told mourners that at the Police Academy classmates remembered Riggs as a leader, someone who was always willing to help others.

Riggs was assigned to Southeast San Diego and worked there throughout his career that began in 1979, the chief said.

“He didn’t want to work anywhere else,” Kolender said, adding that even people he arrested had respect for him.

“Tom didn’t give up,” Kolender said. “If there was a job to be done, he did it. In fact, his partners frequently heard him say ‘Let’s just get the job done.’ Getting the job done was Tom’s philosophy of police work. He loved the job and always looked forward to coming to work. Friends remember his cheerful attitude. He was always happy and his good attitude was contagious.”

Kolender said Riggs was never afraid to live his beliefs. “He wasn’t afraid to die for them. We must not, we will not, let his death have been in vain.”

Afterward, the mourners proceeded to the Evergreen Section of Greenwood Memorial Park for a cemetery service. The I-805 freeway was closed to traffic in all southbound lanes for the motorcade to Greenwood. Cremation was to be conducted, with internment in Greenwood Mausoleum.

City Manager Ray Blair and Deputy City Manager Sue Williams were among the 500 witnesses at the cemetery committal, where a Navy rifle team composed of seven women and one man fired three volleys to give a 21-gun salute, and a navy bugler played taps.

Later, an American flag was removed from Riggs’ silver-colored coffin. Eight police officers that served as pallbearers folded the flag, which was given to Riggs’ wife by Kolender. A California state flag was also presented to her.

Riggs was the son of retired police sergeant Charles Riggs, and the brother-in-law of Timothy Ruopp, one of two police officers shot and killed in Balboa Park last September by a man who was being issued a citation for a routine drinking misdemeanor.

On March 30, 1985, San Bernardino County D.A. Investigator Michael O. Lewis was driving through Flagstaff, Arizona, returning from conducting a follow-up homicide investigation in Indianapolis, Indiana. While driving in a heavy rainstorm, Investigator Lewis lost control of his car and the vehicle overturned. Investigator Lewis died of injuries sustained in the collision.

Investigator Lewis is survived by his wife, Lynn, as well as his daughter and his son.

A freak traffic accident January 27 involving a pickup truck and Pacific Gas & Electric Co. equipment caused the San Jose Police Department’s first death in the line of duty in 15 years.

Patrolman Robert A. White, 25, died after coming into contact with 12,000 volts of electricity while investigating the situation, he somehow was exposed to the current.

Police Chief Joseph McNamara, who visited the scene shortly after the accident, said it was difficult to determine how White came into contact with the electricity.

“We may never know what really happened,” McNamara said. “All we can say is that it looks like the current hit him and knocked him on his back.

“We’re talking about a tremendously powerful transmitter. He may not have even touched it.”

The equipment involved is called a pad-mounted sectioning switch, which is used to preserve some power if a blackout occurs in the surrounding area, a PG&E spokesman said. The switch, which controls the current, sits inside a 3-foot-square metal box that is mounted on a concrete stand.

The PG&E spokesman said the impact of the truck cracked the metal box, exposing a series of wires carrying 12,000 volts.

Chief McNamara called White a “fine officer, who was competent and quiet, but well-liked by his peers.”

White is the fifth San Jose police officer to die in the line of duty and the first since 19709. The bachelor, who had been on the force two years, also is believed to be the youngest.

Funeral services were held at the First Baptist Church of San Jose. Followed by interment at the Oak Hill Cemetery.

Officer Duane C. Johnson, 27, a three-year veteran of the Los Angeles Police Department, was slain in a gun battle with the robbers of a Chinatown jewelry store Dec. 19, 1984.

He was the first Los Angeles Police Department officer to die in the line of duty during 1984, and the third to die in Chinatown in the past 14 months.

At the time of his death, Johnson’s wife, Kathleen, was pregnant with the couple’s first child.

Approximately 2,000 mourners attended the slain officer’s funeral, including his twin brother, Dana, a Virginia Beach, VA police officer, and an older brother, Steven, a police officer in Jamestown, New York.

Johnson said he and his brother, who joined their respective forces on the same day, gave 100 percent effort whether competing in high school track, or finding a lost dog for a citizen. “Life is too short to expect less than that.”

“We put our heart and soul into everything, (because) everything matters,” he said. Johnson was described as a “6-foot-4, 240 pound teddy bear” with a passion for the tuba and devoted to his wife of two years.

Johnson had told his wife he wanted to be remembered as a musician, a Marine and a police officer.

Leading the funeral cortege was a riderless horse and a team of officers on horseback, followed by several hundred officers on motorcycles or in patrol cars.

In addition to police Chief Daryl Gates, other officials paying their respects to Officer Johnson included Los Angeles Mayor Tom Bradley, District Attorney Ira Reiner, City Councilman Gilbert Lindsay, Sheriff Sherman Block and Police Commissioners Barbara Schlei and Bert Boeckmann.

KILLER SENTENCED
Los Angeles Times
By Edwin Chen, Times Staff Writer

A contrite Hau Cheong (Peter) Chan, convicted of second-degree murder in the 1984 killing of a Los Angeles police officer during a Chinatown robbery attempt, was given a state prison term of 38 years to life Sept. 27, 1987.

The sentencing by Superior Court Judge Jean Matusinka capped 1 ½ days of acrimonious wrangling between Chan’s defense attorneys and prosecutor Lawrence Longo over the contents of Chan’s probation report.

That report, still to be completed, would serve as a key document for the state Board of Prison Terms when the time comes to consider Chan for parole, which could occur in about 22 years, according to lawyers in the case.

Archie Nagao, the Los Angeles police officer who was shot but survived the shoot-out, attended the court session, wearing a knit shirt and slacks on a day of vacation. He said Chan’s sentence was “better than nothing.”

Seconds later, as those in the courtroom began to disperse, Officer Nagao and Leslie Abramson, one of Chan’s lawyers, had a sharp exchange that ended with Nagao saying acidly to Abramson, “He’s alive.”

“So are you,” Abramson replied.

“But Duane isn’t,” Nagao answered, referring to his dead partner, Duane Johnson. Nagao then turned and walked out of the courtroom.

Chan had been scheduled for sentencing last month, but Matusinka postponed it after Abramson complained that the probation report contained numerous errors and omissions. Abramson said the report contained “quadruple levels of hearsay going back 12 years.”

Matusinka agreed that the report was “very, very one-sided.” And after sentencing Chan, she order the County Probation Department to prepare a new report, with assistance from Longo as well as from the defense.