A torrent of gunfire shots killed officer Natalie Corona

Davis Police Officer Natalie Corona passed away after a determined and frightening ambush of a city citizen on a bicycle who went to the scene of the accident on which she was traveling. investigated Thursday night, then opened fire with a rain of bullets fired by a semi-automatic handgun. said the police.

Chief Darren Pytel described an inexplicable attack that began just before 7 pm Corona reacts to a collision between three cars near the 5th and D streets.

While chatting with one of the motorists, the shooter slid on a bicycle, stopped in the shadows on a sidewalk, and then walked towards

"The suspect has just shot, shot her once and she fell to the ground, and he ended up shooting her repeatedly, "said Pytel at a press conference. Friday night at the police headquarters. "At that time, he unloaded a magazine, reloaded and started to turn in another direction."

Shooting 24 hours before was indiscriminate.Pytel said: Corona, who was wearing a protective vest, was shot in the nape of the neck then fell, then was shot several times. [19659008] "This clearly sounds like an ambush," said the leader, adding, "At this point, we speculate that she has never seen it."

After firing at Corona, the shooter was open on the surrounding scene, hitting a fire truck, a house, a bus that was passing, shooting through a worn backpack, by a young woman who was saved when the bullet was lodged in a manual and fired at a firefighter who escaped but who had been hit on the boot but that i was not injured.

Corona was the only victim of the shooting that ended when the shooter ran to a rental house, he shared with a roommate a 501 E St., Pytel said.

"It appeared that he had practically circled the block," said Pytel, leaving a backpack and going to his home. Once there, the shooter met his roommate without giving any indication of the rampage he had just led to the outside.

Police officers from across the region rushed to the normally quiet university town, eventually surrounding the house.

But even this show of strength seemed to have little impact when the shooter emerged from the house.

"He went out at one point," said Pytel. "It seemed to the officers that he was wearing a bulletproof vest, a bulletproof vest. He shouted stuff, got home and got out with a gun, then got home, pushed a sofa in front of the door and the police heard a shot.

The gunman shot himself in the head inside the house. Said Pytel, leaving a complete mystery for now on what might have triggered it.

Authorities have still not disclosed the shooter's name, saying that they may not have it until next week, but Pytel said that he's not going to be there. Had no history of violence or threats. His only contact with the Davis police had occurred last year when he said he had been a victim of a crime, "nothing out of the ordinary," said the chief.

Despite the unleashing, the police did not fire once. , Says Pytel, and much of the initial shooting was apparently captured by the camera embedded in the Corona SUV.

"It looks like the video is still spinning and that it was not even uploaded to the system because the video was so long since the car's camera," he said. he declared.

Corona was also wearing a body camera, but Pytel said that it was not certain that it was activated.

Corona, who graduated from the Sacramento Police Department's training academy in July and completed her field training just before Christmas, responded to the accident. only scene.

Christian Pascual, a 25-year-old UC Davis graduate, was driving a 1996 Infiniti on Fifth Street just before 7 pm. when another vehicle hit his car and caused Pascual to lose control and crash into a third vehicle, he told The Sacramento Bee on Friday morning.

Pascual got out of his car to exchange information with other drivers when Corona arrived and started talking. the drivers.

"I gave her my license and she was about to give it to me," said Pascual. "It was at that time that I heard the shots."

He said the shots came from behind him, the shooter tugging on his right shoulder so close to his ear that he was suffering from a hearing loss on Friday morning.

"The person was behind me and suddenly I heard gunshots," he said .

Pascual added that he did not think that the shooter was one of the drivers involved in the collision and appeared to be a passer-by

.

"When I looked up and saw the agent on the ground, he was already walking west towards C Street, as if shooting at people that seemed to me random "Pascual added that he knew then that he had to flee.

"I just knew I had to get out of there once I saw the gun and what was happening," he said. "I consider myself rather lucky not to think of myself."

Pascual, now a graduate student at Columbia University in New York, said that he was going to the campus of the University of New York. 39, University of California Davis to visit friends when the incident began and after seeing Corona shot, he ran into D Street and hid in bushes

Another witness told the police that she was about fifteen meters from the gunman when she saw him open fire. The woman, who was upset and did not want to be named, arrived at the Davis Police Headquarters Friday afternoon, accompanied by two friends, to announce that she had found a bullet in the backpack that She wore Thursday night.

The authorities continued to investigate why the gunman opened fire. Pytel said that he did not know if he had left any notes or possible explanations for the rampage, and that he could not yet reveal the suspect's identity without letting him go. authorization of the Yolo County Coroner.

The death of Corona was the first task to be accomplished. After killing the department for nearly 60 years, his officers and civilian staff were "utterly devastated," said the chief.

"She was a rising star in the department," said Pytel. "She just worked as if you could not believe it."

Officers from all over the Bay Area and region invaded Davis after the shooting, forcing housekeeping warnings on the spot for UC Davis students and prompting a multitude of text messages and phones. and e-mail alerts to the community.

The Davis Department is relatively small, with 61 sworn officers and 34 civilian employees, and Davis Police spokesman Lieutenant Paul Doroshov describes him as a family, saying the officers were "quite shocked." By

In its 2017 Annual Report, the Ministry reported that property and violent crime has been steadily decreasing, with one homicide reported in 2017 and none in 2016.

No police officers reported been killed in the performance of his duties since. Douglas Cantrill was shot dead on September 7, 1959.

According to the previous story of The Sacramento Bee, the 23-year-old police officer was reported shot dead in his cruiser along the street. A man and a woman acting suspiciously at a neighbor's house when a fight broke out and the murderer shot him with his service pistol.

Cantrill, who had served in the Davis Force for only one month after two years in law enforcement, left behind a woman and a toddler, the district attorney's office announced. . His name is among the eleven on the Yolo County, Woodland War Memorial.

Davis police have entrusted the corona shootings investigation to the Sacramento County Sheriff's Department, where there were 14 homicide detectives and investigators from the crime scene at the scene. crime. Corona is being killed and the house where the gunman is killed.

Sheriff & # 39; s Sgt. Shaun Hampton said that Sacramento had been solicited because the department was much larger than the Davis Police Department and that he used to shoot with police firing bullets.

"Unfortunately, we are not strangers to police officers who are being killed duty," Hampton said, citing the fact that three Sacramento MPs have been shot dead since 2014.

Some Downtown Streets Davis remained closed on Friday as investigators tried to reconstruct the trigger for the shooting.

Gov. Gavin Newsom issued a statement Friday in which he lamented his loss.

"Jennifer and I are terribly saddened to learn of the death of Officer Corona," says the governor's release. "Officer Corona protected her community from injuries when she was tragically affected in the performance of her duties.

" Despite the valiant efforts of paramedics who have taken to the hospital and the staff of the UC Davis Medical Center, she succumbed to her injuries. "

A candlelight vigil is scheduled in Davis for Saturday from 6 pm. at 9 pm in Central Park, and Pytel said that a guard of honor of officers would remain in the custody of Corona until his burial.

The murdered officer was highly regarded by his co-workers for his exuberance and love of work, said Pytel. "I do not think I've ever worked with anyone like her," said the chef.

Bee's staff editors Ryan Sabalow, Hannah Darden and Vincent Moleski contributed to this report.