[narrator] In the New Mexico desert...
[Deputy Townsend shouting]
...a carjacking turns deadly.
[gunshots]
[screams]
[Deputy Townsend speaking]
If they're willing to shoot a deputy,
there's no telling what else they're willing to do.
-[siren wailing] -[gunshots]
[glass breaking]
[narrator] In Oklahoma...
[Officer Hughes speaking]
Her expression was one of pure terror.
[siren wailing]
Driving a lifted pickup truck that fast,
it really is a recipe for disaster.
-[thuds] -[tires screeching]
[Officer Montague speaking]
[indistinct radio chatter]
[officer] Sheriff's office, come outside!
[narrator] In the New Mexico desert,
14 miles south of Albuquerque is Valencia County.
[Deputy Sacoman] I've been in law enforcement
for going on four years now.
I did a ride-along.
It was my 18th birthday,
so I guess it kind of made it a little more special.
And from that day on,
it was something that I wanted to do.
Every day is different
and you don't know what's coming.
[narrator] Deputy Sacoman and Townsend
are called to investigate a car
abandoned by two suspicious people
in the Chihuahuan Desert.
It was [chuckles] supposed to be
my Saturday, um, my day off,
and I received a call from Sergeant Duran.
He asked if I could come out and help cover shift.
Usually when... When vehicles are abandoned further out,
it generally means they're most likely stolen.
When we got there to the car,
we noticed that it was buried in sand.
[Deputy Townsend] I conducted a records check
of the license plate.
The license plate belonged to a white Kia.
So I ran the VIN number for the car
and it ended up being a stolen vehicle.
As Deputy Sacoman and I were en route to the call,
we passed two individuals, a male and a female, walking.
As I passed them,
I remember the male turned
just kind of keeping his eye on us
as we drove past them.
I told Deputy Sacoman,
"Let's go see if we can make contact
"with the two individuals
"that were walking down the road."
[Deputy Sacoman] We did have our guns drawn.
You don't wanna have someone pull a gun to your face
and you don't have a way
to protect yourself or your partner.
[Deputy Sacoman speaking]
[Deputy Townsend speaking]
[Deputy Sacoman speaking]
[narrator] The suspects have disappeared.
Townsend returns to the stolen vehicle
to wait for a tow truck
and sends Sacoman back to town.
[Deputy Sacoman] There was something that kind of felt off.
I couldn't tell you what, um,
but I... I did ask him multiple times,
like, "Are you sure you don't want me to stay with you?"
But he... He was insistent that he was okay.
[Deputy Townsend] I proceeded to the location
and I noticed there was the white truck
where that car was at.
As I come around the back side of this truck,
there's one gentleman standing over by the tailgate.
And then I observe the male and female
that Deputy Sacoman and I had gone looking for
underneath the back of the car.
[Deputy Townsend speaking]
The gentleman had crawled out
from underneath the back of the car
and stood up and turned and faced me.
And he's just staring right through me
as if I don't exist.
[Deputy Townsend speaking]
[indistinct shouting]
[screams]
He made a run for the car.
When he started driving away,
the girlfriend started yelling for him to not leave her.
He slowed the vehicle down
to let her jump in the passenger seat.
[indistinct shouting]
I grabbed ahold of his left arm.
I was gonna pull him out.
[indistinct shouting]
At that point, he instantly started
digging in his waistband.
Then in my head, I'm going,
"We're going into a gunfight.
"This is happening now."
I went to get behind the trunk for cover,
that other gentleman who was standing there
and I don't know who he is.
So I didn't want him behind me.
I end up having to just peel off
and I wind up in the desert.
I'm just kind of a sitting duck at this point.
In about that time,
the subject's first shot goes off.
[screams]
I felt like I got hit by the world's
largest sledgehammer [chuckles] in my right leg.
[muffled heart beating]
I started seeing flashbacks from a friend of mine
that had gotten killed earlier this year.
[screams]
And that subject ended up walking right up
and shooting him point blank.
And I was just kind of still fighting,
but waiting for that exact same situation to unfold.
And just kind of realizing that, you know,
you might not get to talk to your family again.
[Deputy Townsend breathing heavily]
I looked up to see them running.
He jumps into that gentleman's white truck
and the girlfriend jumped in the passenger seat.
[Deputy Townsend shouting]
[Deputy Sacoman] No police officer wants to hear that.
I was all focused on... On just getting there.
My adrenaline was very, very high.
[narrator] The third man whose Dodge truck
has now been carjacked
is just an innocent bystander who'd stopped to help.
[Deputy Townsend grunting]
[man speaking]
[Deputy Townsend speaking]
[man] Be careful. Be careful.
[Deputy Townsend breathing heavily]
[man] Be careful.
[Deputy Townsend speaking]
[breathing heavily]
I heard Townsend calling on the radio air
that shots had been fired
and, uh, that he had been shot.
Immediately, I left the sheriff's office,
you know, lights and sirens,
[Sgt. Duran speaking over radio]
[Deputy Townsend speaking]
Panic starts to set in, uh,
because as a... As a first line supervisor,
it is your job to make sure that your deputy is okay.
I just remembered, 'This guy shouldn't even be on shift,
"and now his life is on the line."
[Sgt. Duran speaking over radio]
[Deputy Townsend speaking]
[Deputy Townsend] At this point,
shock was finally starting to kind of set in.
I looked down and I still had blood coming out,
and I knew, "Okay, well, this is not good." [chuckles]
Especially as red as that one was.
I was like, "This is not a good sign."
[Sgt. Duran speaking]
[Deputy Townsend speaking]
[Sgt. Duran speaking]
I can hear the sirens coming from a good ways.
[grunts]
[Deputy Sacoman speaking]
[Deputy Townsend speaking]
[Sgt. Duran speaking indistinctly over radio]
[Deputy Sacoman speaking]
[Deputy Townsend speaking]
-[Deputy Sacoman speaking] -[Deputy Townsend grunting in pain]
[Deputy Sacoman] To see him like that, it...
It hurt... It hurt me.
No one wants to...
To see their partner in that situation.
I was scared.
[Deputy Sacoman speaking]
[Deputy Townsend speaking]
[Deputy Sacoman speaking]
[Deputy Sacoman] He was starting to feel thirsty.
That in itself is a sign of somebody
that has lost a significant amount of blood.
[Deputy Sacoman speaking]
[narrator] Over on Highway 6,
Sergeant Duran is leading the pursuit
-of the fleeing suspect. -[siren wailing]
[Sgt. Duran speaking]
I do see this white Dodge pickup truck
that is driving erratic.
[Sgt. Duran speaking over radio]
[Deputy Sacoman speaking]
[Sgt. Duran speaking]
We're attempting to conduct a traffic stop
and immediately they disregarded my lights and sirens,
began to drive in a reckless manner.
You have a whole cavalry of patrol units
from both our agency and neighbor agencies
that are headed that way.
[siren wailing]
[Sgt. Duran speaking]
[female officer speaking]
[Sgt. Duran speaking]
[narrator] Officers radio a code 48,
meaning use caution.
You know that these are the people
that just shot one officer.
So you know what they're capable of doing.
And you know that you are now placing yourself
in that same danger.
[Sgt. Duran speaking]
Getting into the village of Los Lunas,
it's right around 3:00 p.m.
This is a time when school's letting out.
Some people are getting off of... Off of work.
[Sgt. Duran speaking]
[siren wailing]
He cut in between several lanes of travel
and he caused several accidents.
[siren wailing]
[Sgt. Duran speaking]
I start to weigh the options, you know, risk versus reward.
It's a very difficult situation
because by letting them go, you may be stopping
this erratic driving of causing crashes,
but you also have to understand
that by letting them go,
are you allowing them the opportunity to hurt somebody else?
[Sgt. Duran speaking]
[honking]
If they are willing to drive in the manner that they are driving
and shoot a deputy,
there's no telling what else they're willing to do,
even if that means taking an innocent life.
[Sgt. Duran speaking]
[siren wailing]
[Sgt. Duran speaking]
-[engine revving] -[siren wailing]
[Sgt. Duran speaking]
This is a parking lot.
There's so many motorists
within 10 ft of where this is happening.
It wasn't the appropriate time, you know, to take deadly force.
[officer speaking over radio]
[Sgt. Duran speaking]
There are still neighborhoods in that area.
I didn't know if this suspect
was going to try and turn into these neighborhoods.
[Sgt. Duran speaking]
I just remember the suspect vehicle
veering off the road.
[Sgt. Duran speaking]
At that time, the driver made the decision
of just slamming their brakes.
I'm forced to do the same thing
and I end up a little bit ahead of their vehicle.
[Sgt. Duran speaking]
[siren wailing]
[gunshots]
[glass breaking]
[bleep]
[Sgt. Duran speaking]
[yelps]
[siren wailing]
[gunshots]
[glass breaking]
[bleep]
[Sgt. Duran speaking]
[yelps]
The suspect turns a gun in my direction,
and he fires a series of shots.
[gunshots]
[Sgt. Duran] I'm exposed.
I start to walk backwards
to have some type of cover.
Because all of this is... Is taking place,
it's going by so quick,
quicker than your mind can process.
[siren wailing]
[gunshots]
I could not only hear
the projectiles whizzing by my head,
but I could feel the heat of the rounds.
That's how close they were to me.
[gun firing continues]
[glass breaking]
As I'm about to return fire,
I feel impact on my face.
[glass breaking]
I just felt loud ringing in my ears
and I couldn't see anything.
And I also felt this burning sensation on my face,
which I can only think that I had been shot.
I thought I had been shot in my face.
But it doesn't mean that I'm willing to just give up.
The suspect, I know that he's coming in my direction.
I start to get a little bit of vision
back in my right eye.
And I can hear, uh, the suspect getting closer.
[Sgt. Duran speaking]
I fired a series of shots and I knew I had hit him.
-[gun firing] -[bleeping]
And during that time, Officer Silva
and Deputy Malsaman turned the bed of my unit.
[siren wailing]
[deputy shouting]
[Sgt. Duran speaking]
[deputy speaking]
[officer speaking]
[Sgt. Duran speaking]
[officer speaking]
[Sgt. Duran] After this, it's just a big blur.
I'm still alive.
You know, I'm hurting, but, uh, I'm still alive.
[narrator] Duran's been hit by shrapnel
from a shattered window.
[officer 1 speaking over radio]
[officer 2 speaking]
[narrator] The suspect is down,
but his girlfriend is nowhere to be seen.
[officer 2 speaking]
-[officer 3] Clear. -[siren wailing]
[officer 4 speaking]
[woman speaking]
[officer 4 speaking]
[woman speaking]
[indistinct radio chatter]
[officer speaking]
[narrator] The suspect is later identified
as 28-year-old Jose Baca.
He is pronounced dead at the scene.
Charges against the female passenger
were ultimately dismissed.
One of the biggest things that I was very thankful for
is the fact that
Deputy Townsend stayed in the fight.
He stayed in the fight, uh, which saved his life.
[gunshots]
[Deputy Townsend] So, I was hit one time in the right leg.
Since my shooting, um, I had to medically retire.
I'm still hoping
that one day I can get back to the job.
I would think about this incident a lot
after it happened for quite a while.
What I would have done different
or how it would have played out different.
I don't think it's something I'll ever forget.
To this day, I still have several pieces of glass
and another shrapnel in my face.
I've always known when I leave for work,
I may not come back.
That's what comes with the territory
of being a police officer.
During the entirety of this incident,
I had been thinking about my family continuously.
[siren wailing]
When I got home,
a lot of my friends and family had been there.
by my wife and my kids' side.
It was comforting to know that they weren't there alone.
Um... [clears throat]
Yeah.
[narrator] In Oklahoma,
in Cleveland County
is the city of Moore.
[Officer Darwent] The city of Moore has small town vibes
with the amenities of a big city.
It's more of a residential area.
People are friendly
and they genuinely care about one another.
I was working baker shift,
which is our evening shift,
which runs from 3:00 in the afternoon to midnight.
It tends to be our busiest shift.
So a lot of times, you're...
You're running from call to call to call,
so it can be very, very hectic.
[narrator] Midway through his shift,
Officer Darwent receives a disturbing call from dispatch.
[Officer Darwent] The call comes out to a domestic
where a third-party witness had called
stating that his neighbor
was essentially screaming, "Bloody murderer."
I don't have my lights and sirens running
to a domestic violence call.
We want to show up
and still have the element
of what is essentially a surprise.
[car door opens and closes]
[Officer Darwent speaking]
[man speaking]
[Officer Darwent speaking]
[man speaking]
[woman speaking]
[Officer Darwent speaking]
-[woman speaking] -[dog barking]
[Officer Darwent] A lot of times, people will call in things,
and they maybe will be exaggerated.
But, I don't know,
something just felt off.
Domestic violence calls
are some of the most dangerous calls that we can go on.
Uh, we're going into someone's house,
and we don't know what kind of weapons they have in there,
what their intentions are,
or just who they are, in general.
-[knocking at door] -[dogs barking]
[Officer Darwent] No one was coming to the front door.
No one was yelling.
No one was even telling the dogs to be quiet.
[narrator] Officer Hughes is now dispatched to assist.
You have a small snapshot from what they've told you,
and so, you don't know
what you're going to walk into when you get to that house.
[Officer Hughes whispering]
[Officer Darwent] Officer Hughes and I are...
I think we're pretty good partners.
If I tell him that I feel something's off,
he's going to trust it.
If he tells me, I'll trust the exact same thing.
[Officer Hughes speaking]
Officer Hughes is trying to get another vantage point
into the residence
to see if maybe
there's something else that I'm not seeing.
[dog barking]
[Officer Hughes speaking]
[Officer Hughes] No signs of a struggle.
No signs of a fight.
Uh, there... There's no blood on the floor.
We can't just go kicking in the door
just 'cause we have a hunch. We have to have a reason.
[intense music playing]
[dog barks, whimpers]
[Officer Hughes speaking]
[Officer Darwent speaking]
[Officer Hughes speaking]
-[banging on door] -[dogs barking]
The dog came running up to the door
like every dog does.
He started barking at the door,
and then they started to do something strange.
They...
They wouldn't stay at the door
like you would imagine a typical dog would do
and continue to bark at the stranger
in front of their house.
They would run into the very the back corner of the hallway
that I could see down.
And it just felt off.
We both believed that
there was somebody in that room.
[Officer Darwent] Is there someone laying back there?
Is there someone being held hostage
and being told to be quiet?
Is there someone that's being threatened
with serious acts of violence that says,
"Hey, if you answer the door,
"something bad is going to happen to you."
[Officer Hughes] I wanted to go back
and talk to the reporting party.
Sometimes talking to people a second time
will cause them to remember something else.
[indistinct conversation]
[Officer Hughes speaking]
[woman speaking]
[Officer Hughes speaking]
[man speaking]
-[Officer Hughes clears throat] -[man continues speaking]
[Officer Hughes speaking]
-[man speaking] -[woman] Bronco.
[woman speaking]
[Officer Hughes speaking]
-[man speaking] -[woman] No.
[dogs barking]
So, at this moment, we can't just kick the door
and go inside the residence
until we have a reason
to think that someone's in serious danger.
We can't just go inside the house,
and everything maybe
very suspicious,
but that's all it is, it's suspicious.
[Officer Darwent speaking]
[Officer Hughes] So the neighbor mentions the cars.
[Officer Hughes speaking]
[Officer Hughes] You can't... You can't access them from the front.
The only way to access the back of these houses
is to go around to the alley.
[suspenseful music playing]
[Officer Hughes] As soon as we're round the corner,
there's only one vehicle.
White SUV.
Headlights are on.
There's a male walking around it,
and, uh, it seems like as he notices us,
he walks back into the garage of the house
and then the garage door closes.
I definitely remember thinking that could be, uh, the male.
We see no signs of anybody else.
[Officer Darwent speaking indistinctly]
[Officer Hughes speaking]
[Officer Hughes] We kind of look around the car some.
We look in the car.
I remember noticing hair in the... In the car.
And about that time,
the garage door started to open again.
Since we had only seen the male
who we believed to be the suspect,
we thought it might be him coming back out.
And, uh, we both walked back behind that...
That SUV to get cover.
[foreboding music playing]
But I realized it was our victim walking outside.
Her expression was one of pure terror.
[narrator] Dispatch alerts officers
to an urgent update from a neighbor.
[dispatcher 1 over radio]
[Officer Hughes speaking]
[dispatcher 2 speaking over radio]
[continues indistinctly]
[narrator] Officer Darwent stays with the victim
while Officer Hughes starts tracking the suspect.
All I know is that he's running,
and so my thought process is,
"Well, I'm in a car and he's running.
"If he just continues running north, I'll find him."
[Officer Hughes speaking]
[dispatcher] Unsure if he went left or right at 19th.
[narrator] The victim tells Officer Darwent
her account of what happened inside the house.
[Officer Darwent speaking]
I had never really come across anything to this extent.
When she showed me her injuries,
you know, I needed to do everything I could to help her.
[Officer Hughes speaking]
[dispatcher speaking indistinctly]
[Officer Hughes speaking]
[engine revving]
[Officer Darwent speaking over radio]
[female officer speaking]
[Officer Darwent speaking]
[Officer Darwent] Dispatch then gets back to me
and tells me that
he has confirmed felony warrants out of Arkansas
for kidnap and domestic battery.
[siren wailing]
We need to find this guy and we need to capture him.
[Lt. Ellis speaking]
Flock camera system are a license plate reader,
and it will take a photograph of the vehicle and the license plate
so you can locate suspect vehicle you're searching for.
[Lt. Ellis speaking]
[female officer speaking]
I remember thinking Psycho 1,
that's awful fitting for someone
who has charges for kidnapping and domestic violence
to the level that this guy does.
[narrator] Lieutenant Ellis joins the frantic hunt for Schaeffer.
It sounded like this suspect was a dangerous person.
We wanted to make sure
that we could do everything in our power
to keep him from hurting anyone else.
[Lt. Ellis speaking]
[siren wailing]
[lt. ellis] He guns it and is trying to get away from me at that point.
[Officer Hughes speaking]
And when you suspect that a suspect may be armed,
it just increases the danger for everyone.
[intense music playing]
[narrator] Officer Montague also joins the highspeed pursuit.
[Officer Montague] I'm kind of trying to go
where I believed that they were gonna be headed.
[Officer Montague speaking]
[female officer speaking]
I set up my vehicle at a point
where the suspect vehicle was eventually gonna
dump back out onto the street at
and I would be waiting for him.
-[siren wailing] -[engine revving]
[female officer] Go ahead.
[Officer Montague speaking indistinctly]
[Officer Montague] The fact that he is in a lifted pickup truck,
he's able to jump over curbs,
so, he was able to pretty much drive wherever he wanted.
Me driving a Ford Explorer
is a little bit more challenging.
[Officer Montague speaking]
[dispatcher speaking]
He's driving as if he's the only one out there.
[indistinct radio chatter]
[tires screeching]
[siren wailing]
[Lt. Ellis] I'm some ways back now.
And so, I'm trying to catch up.
[siren wailing]
The danger to the public just continues to increase
by his level of reckless driving.
[intense music playing]
Driving a lifted pickup truck that fast
making those kind of turns,
it really is a recipe for disaster.
[siren wailing]
He slammed on his brakes, and I just remember
seeing the sparks flying out of his wheel well.
[intense music playing]
[siren wailing]
Once we got on that service road,
he was pushing about 100 miles an hour.
The longer this goes on,
the more at risk the public is.
I just thought to myself, "It's now or never."
[vibrato intensifying]
-[thuds] -[tires screeching]
[Officer Montague speaking]
So when he slammed on his brakes,
it was pretty obvious that it wasn't to avoid me,
it was to... To make me crash,
but it set me up
to TVI his vehicle.
A TVI or a tactical vehicle intervention,
basically, it's a controlled collision,
um, initiated by the officer with the suspect vehicle
to disable their vehicle.
-[thuds] -[tires screeching]
Being that this was a lifted pickup truck,
I kind of already had the feeling
that this was going to roll.
[siren wailing]
[dispatcher] TVI.
[Officer Montague] It was shocking to see.
I turned my sirens off
and ran to the rear of my vehicle,
which afforded me the best cover
because he's potentially armed.
There is very much still a threat.
[Officer Montague speaking]
[shouting]
[indistinct radio chatter]
Being that I was there by myself,
I was going to wait for additional resources
and backing officers to get there to help me out.
[Officer Montague speaking]
I saw the suspect walking.
He had gotten out of the vehicle,
evidently from the other side
and was walking away from the truck.
[siren wailing]
[female officer shouting]
[Officer Montague speaking]
I don't think it took that long,
but it feels like it's forever
before I can actually get up there
and assist Officer Montague.
[Lt. Ellis speaking]
I see the suspect vehicle
that's flipped over on its roof.
Um, it seemed like there's pretty significant damage to the vehicle.
[Officer Montague speaking]
He basically knew that, kind of, the gig is up
and he's been caught,
and so he... He really didn't put up a fight.
I think he's very lucky to be alive.
[narrator] Darren Wayne Schaeffer
is charged with seven offenses,
including kidnapping, domestic assault and battery.
He is currently waiting to stand trial.
I was glad that the suspect had been taken into custody,
and, uh, I was glad that nobody else
had gotten hurt during the pursuit.
It endangered
basically the entirety of the city of Moore.
[Officer Darwent] This definitely had a lasting impression on me.
There are people that suffer
from the hands of truly evil people.
[narrator] In New Mexico...
I was expecting he was getting ready to run.
[gun shot blast]
The guy, like, [bleep] shot me.
[narrator] In Ohio...
It's like being in a movie.
♪