Police Save & Then Kill Man

No, I am not making this up.

A man who went overboard during a party cruise in the San Diego Bay was killed by police Saturday night after he attacked the officers who had tried to rescue him, police said today.

Police said the man was on a party cruise with at least 800 other people when he somehow ended up in the water after 11 p.m. He was identified today as Steven Paul Hirschfield, 37, of Los Angeles.

The boat's captain sent a distress signal, and two Harbor Police boats and one boat from the U.S. Coast Guard responded and pulled Hirschfield from the water.

But Hirschfield began fighting with police as soon as he was on board, said San Diego Harbor Police Sgt. Dave Fouser.



"You're trying to help some guy out the water and he's fighting," Fouser said. "He became very combative with the officers, and somewhere in the course of the fight, he was able to get one of the officer's Tasers away from him."

Fouser said Hirschfield knocked one officer to the deck and then used the Taser to strike him in the face. When Hirschfield then tried to grab one of the officer's guns, Fouser said, the other officer shot him.

Hirschfield was taken to an ambulance waiting on land nearby and was pronounced dead from the single gunshot wound, Fouser said.

The San Diego Police Department's homicide unit is investigating the shooting along with the San Diego Harbor Police Department and the county district attorney's office. It's unclear how many of the 800 passengers on the party cruise saw the incident, but police said they took the names and contact information for all those on board.

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Wow.