Officer Timothy Abernethy was working overtime Sunday morning to make a troubled neighborhood safer. Instead, Abernethy became a target himself, killed when a traffic stop ended in an ambush.
The 11-year veteran of the Houston Police Department pulled over a red Dodge Durango for a minor traffic violation at 8:30 a.m., and had just submitted the car's license plate to a dispatcher when the driver took off running.
Abernethy followed, chasing the man through the Luxor Park apartment complex in a part of northwest Houston so dangerous police include it in a special "hot spot" program to put more officers on the street.
Abernethy, 43, was working alone. He didn't have time to call for backup.
The man took off past the leasing office and followed a path that skirted the complex's swimming pool, said witnesses who watched the pursuit. Abernathy followed, his gun drawn, losing sight of the man as he turned a corner toward the playground.
Witnesses say the man ducked and waited behind a gray wooden gate, just behind the playground. A few seconds later, Abernethy ran by, and the man shot him in the head from less than 10 feet away.
The police officer collapsed on the ground.
The broad-daylight shooting happened as many residents were heading for church or running their morning errands, and a number of people came forward with descriptions of the shooter.
By Sunday afternoon, following a second chase during which a sheriff's deputy fired a shotgun but did not hit anyone, police said they had the suspect in custody. They declined to identify him Sunday, saying they didn't want to jeopardize his cooperation. They did note that he had a history of violent crimes.
Meanwhile, Abernethy's colleagues gathered at Memorial Hermann Hospital-The Texas Medical Center, where the officer was pronounced dead.
During his years on the force, Abernethy had worked on a gang unit and on patrol. His latest assignment was to a special projects post, reporting directly to the captain of North Command, said Gary Blankinship, president of the Houston Police Officers' Union.
"I understand he was awaiting a transfer to the bomb squad," Blankinship said. "That's a very elite job to be selected for."
Married, two children
Abernethy leaves behind a wife and two children: a 21-year-old daughter who just graduated from Texas A&M University and a 20-year-old son stationed in Italy as a master at arms in the U.S. Navy.
"My father was a great man, and now he is an angel," his son Tim Abernethy Jr. wrote in a message from his Navy post. "I only hope that people understand what sacrifices are made when you have a family member who works a job where they risk their lives every day."
The shooting prompted new criticism from those who have long argued the Police Department shouldn't have officers patrol alone.
Joslyn Johnson, a police officer whose husband and fellow officer, Rodney Johnson, was shot in 2006, said each patrol car should include two officers.
Mayor Bill White defended the current policy and said that "in this case, there's not any evidence that having two officers rather than one would have made a difference."
At Luxor Park, residents said Sunday that they rarely see fewer than two or three police officers at a time on the gunshot-studded grounds.
Willie Fleming, a 47-year-old outreach minister with Community of Faith church, said he moved to the the troubled complex as part of a gang intervention mission. Fleming was just leaving for church Sunday morning when he heard four shots across the parking lot, then watched as a man wearing a black leather jacket jogged away. When he moved closer, he saw Abernethy lying on his side, his black jacket emblazoned with yellow letters: "Houston Police."
Abernethy lay less than 50 feet away from where a 22-year-old man had been gunned down on the other side of the playground last month. Fleming rushed to the officer's aid but found him motionless and without a pulse.
Help from bystanders
Within minutes, several other people emerged from neighboring apartments. Angel McCullough brought a cold towel to apply to Abernethy's head wound at a 911 dispatcher's suggestion.
She sobbed as she saw the officer take one of his last breaths.
"I want his family to know that he wasn't alone when he died," the 23-year-old said.
A second police officer arrived a few minutes later, and paramedics arrived within 10 more minutes, Fleming said.
Those who saw the shooting's aftermath said the gunman was nonchalant as he retreated from his crouching spot behind the gate.
"He was cool as ice," Fleming said. "He had a nice little trot."
The man retraced his steps back toward the leasing office, where his car was parked. He hesitated for a moment on the path, then took off in the Durango.
Another chase
When police checked Abernethy's patrol car, they found the Durango's license plate number still up on the computer. The officer hadn't had time to run a criminal records check, said Capt. Bruce Williams.
Sheriff's deputies found the car at 9 a.m. in the driveway of its registered address, about eight miles north of Luxor Park. While deputies surrounded the house, a man emerged from it and took off running. Deputies chased after him and had him in custody within five minutes, said Lt. John Legg of the Harris County Sheriff's Office. One deputy fired a shotgun but did not hit anyone, Legg said.
By late Sunday, the man had not yet been charged, but police said they expected to file charges by today.
As dusk fell at Luxor Park, they were searching — with the suspect's help — for the gun that killed Abernethy. Patrol cars blocked part of Tidwell Road while throngs of officers ducked to look in storm drains and kicked through grass clippings in the road's median.
Chronicle reporters Mike Glenn, Lindsay Wise, Todd Ackerman, Richard Stewart and Ericka Mellon contributed to this report.
http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/front/6151815.html
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