In the middle of a daytime gunbattle involving suspected gang members and police Tuesday, Officer Donyell Briggs encountered a suspicious vehicle fleeing the Southwest Baltimore scene.
The driver, a 49-year-old man who had been carjacked, jumped out and ran toward Briggs shouting, “If I didn?t drive off, he was going to kill me! He was going to shoot me!”
Still inside the vehicle was Robert Campbell, 26, one of two men police say clashed with them moments earlier.
The officer ordered Campbell out of the vehicle and placed under arrest, charging him with carjacking, robbery and assault.
The arrest occurred during a chaotic situation at 2:12 p.m. at West Lanvale and Poplar Grove streets, where one suspect and Officer Mark Spila, 25, a three-year veteran assigned to the Southwest District gang unit, were shot.
Spila was struck once in the thigh. He was listed in critical but stable condition Wednesday after surgery Tuesday night at the University of Maryland Shock Trauma Center. Doctors say his injuries are non-life-threatening.
The suspect was in critical condition Wednesday. Attempted first-degree murder charges are pending, police said.
For hours after the shoot-out, dozens of police officers, including a SWAT team and helicopters, surrounded a nearby row house, believing a third suspect was inside ? though they now realize there were only two suspects involved.
“There was no one else in the house,” said Baltimore police spokesman Sterling Clifford.
The altercation began when two officers pulled over a vehicle containing “known gang members” ? and the car?s passenger jumped out and struggled with Spila, Police Commissioner Frederick Bealefeld said.
The two exchanged gunfire ? striking Spila and breaking his femur ? and the suspect ran around the car and opened fire on several other officers, Clifford said.
“The suspect who had been shot got up and ran into his house across the street,” Clifford said. “He fired at other officers and then went down in the alley.”
Meanwhile, the driver of the vehicle ran down the road where he carjacked a vehicle, but quickly encountered Briggs, who arrested him, police said.
Campbell?s arrest means both suspects involved in the shooting are in police custody, said Clifford, who added that Spila?s condition is improving.
“He?s doing well,” he said of the officer. “He?s under close monitoring.”
