Petaluma officers in fatal shooting on leave

Five Petaluma Police officers are on paid administrative leave while the Sonoma County Sheriff’s Office investigates an April 3 fatal officer-involved shooting, Police Chief Ken Savano said.

Savano said the department would release the names of the officers involved after an internal review to determine the threat to the officers’ safety.

Officers shot Luis Alberto Garcia-Vara, 24, of San Rafael, around 2 p.m. after an armed standoff at The Vineyard, an apartment complex off Ely Boulevard. Five Petaluma officers fired 16 rounds at Garcia-Vara after he brandished a gun at them following negotiations for him to surrender, according to police. Garcia-Vara was hit twice in the abdomen and was transported to a local hospital, where he died at about 10 p.m. the next day, according to the Sonoma County Sheriff’s Office.

“The community has been extremely supportive of our staff in light of the circumstances,” Savano said. “Anytime you have a loss of life it’s tragic. The officers tried courageously to have a peaceful outcome.”

Savano said the department was offering counseling services to staff members. He could not comment on details of the investigation. The Sheriff’s Office is investigating along with the Rohnert Park Department of Public Safety and the county’s District Attorney’s Office, in accordance with countywide fatal incident protocols.

Sheriff’s Office spokesman Spence Crum said the investigation could take several months. An independent forensic pathologist will conduct an autopsy to determine Garcia-Vara’s cause of death.

The incident is the Petaluma Police Department’s first officer-involved shooting since October 2005, when five officers shot and killed a 72-year-old man wanted in Sacramento County on suspicion of molesting his two young stepdaughters. After a car chase, James Anthony Decosta emerged from his vehicle at Dynamic Street near McDowell Boulevard and pointed a loaded semi-automatic pistol at pursuing officers, who fired 42 rounds, hitting him 27 times.

A Santa Rosa police and Sonoma County District Attorney’s Office investigation later cleared the officers, ruling the shooting justifiable.

(Contact Matt Brown at matt.brown@arguscourier.com.)