TULSA, Okla. — What started as a traffic stop Sunday morning ended with a police officer and a suspect shot.
The Tulsa Police Department says it happened around 8:15 a.m. in a neighborhood near 71st and Lewis when a police officer and a rookie officer pulled over a car without a license plate.
“What happened earlier this morning, an officer and that officer’s first-day rookie were out patrolling, they noticed this vehicle, I don’t know if you can see it way back there,” TPD Captain Richard Meulenberg said. “They see a car that has no tag on it whatsoever.”
Meulenberg said when they tried to pull the car over, the driver kept going and eventually stopped in the driveway of a home in the neighborhood.
According to TPD, the suspect did not have a driver’s license and gave police a fake name.
TPD said when police tried to detain the suspect, a struggle broke out and the suspect tried to get a pistol from his waistband.
“As soon as the suspect gets out of the vehicle a scuffle ensues, and this is what I’ve been told, we’re still reviewing camera footage right now, but a scuffle ensues and then he did have a pistol in his waistband, that pistol, either he pulled out or it discharged, but it went off,” Meulenberg said.
TPD said when the gun went off, it hit both the suspect and one of the officers. The other officer fired a round at the suspect.
“The suspect has at least two, if not three, gunshot wounds,” Meulenberg said.
Meulenberg said the officer who was shot was shot in the foot.
TPD said officers, including the officer who was shot, gave the suspect first aid at the scene.
The officer who was shot and the suspect were both later taken to the hospital, according to TPD.
Early in the afternoon police waited on a search warrant for the car while they were searching and placing evidence markers around it in the driveway.
“There’s another gun in the car from what I understand, there’s ammunition and magazines dumped about,” Meulenberg said.
Officers were also seen entering the home, and at least one had his gun drawn.
Investigators still trying to determine what led up to the shooting after a simple traffic stop.
“Homicide units are responding to this only because it’s such an intense and important call,” Meulenberg said.
TPD says both the suspect and the officer will survive their injuries.