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The Movie 44 Minutes Was A True Life Event by Nobody: 6:18pm On May 23, 2017 |
On the morning of February 28, 1997, two
heavily armed men wearing body armor
burst into a Bank of America branch, took a
little more than $300,000 and fired their
way out.
Larry Phillips Jr. and Emil Matasareanu shot
at everything in their path — including
police, bystanders, and a news helicopter —
in an attempt to get away. They had
Kalashnikov rifles filled with armor-piercing
bullets that tore through cement, buildings
and cars, spraying shredded fragments of
glass, metal and concrete as they went.
The gory gunfight is forever etched into the
memories of former LAPD SWAT officer Rick
Massa and Dr. Jorge Montes, a dentist whose
office became an impromptu emergency
room for wounded officers. They are just
two of the heroes of a shootout that riveted
the nation.
Phillips and Matasareanu “had no care for
life,” Massa recalled. “And this was obvious
when they came out of the bank and
started shooting at anyone that moved.
They didn’t care.”
The shots the pair fired were seen and
heard around the world, as the ensuing
confrontation with police was broadcast
live on television. By the time it was over,
12 police officers and eight civilians would
be injured, and the two robbers, Phillips, 26,
and Matasareanu, 30, would be dead.
Incident changed how patrol officers are
armed
“The poor uniformed police officers at that
time were definitely outgunned,” Massa
said. At that time, he said, LAPD patrol
officers didn’t carry assault rifles, and didn’t
have weapons that could pierce body
armor.
But the weapons Phillips and Matasareanu
had could penetrate the officers’ vests “like
a hot knife through butter,” Massa said.
“The Battle of North Hollywood,” as it came
to be known, would change how routine
police patrol officers are armed in Los
Angeles and beyond.
“Our units carry AR-15s now,” Capt. Johnny
Starling of the California Highway Patrol
West Valley division. “We don’t have to
confront suspects as close instantly. Even
our patrol cars have Kevlar side panels.
Before they were made of sheet metal that
couldn’t stop bullets.”
Police departments across the country are
better equipped today as a result of the
shootout, Burbank Police chief Scott
LaChasse said. “We carry urban police rifles
now,” he said. “We can deploy much
differently because of that. You now have
the firepower so you can take suspects
down at a distance.”
‘Multiple officers shot’
Massa was getting ready for a jog at the
police academy that morning with fellow
SWAT team member Steve Gomez when
they heard frantic reports of a shooting at a
North Hollywood bank.
Massa changed into his SWAT gear, but
Gomez didn’t have time — in news footage
from the day, he can be seen firing at the
robbers while wearing shorts.
“Multiple officers shot,” the 911 dispatcher
could be heard saying on the radio.
Another of the SWAT members, Donny
Anderson, joined his colleagues.
The robbers seemed to have had some
practice. The FBI said it suspected them in
two other similar suburban bank robberies,
the Associated Press reported at the time.
Police in nearby Glendale told the news
service that Phillips and Matasareanu had
been arrested in 1993, after officers
discovered weapons, smoke bombs and
disguises in their car during a traffic stop.
On February 28, the duo had planned to rob
the bank of $750,000, according to multiple
news reports, but a change in the delivery
schedule left much less money inside. An
angry Matasareanu destroyed some money
when he shot 75 rounds into a safe. The
money they did manage to leave with was
ruined by dye packs.
As the robbers exited, the undermanned
police responding to the robbery call
couldn’t know that they were about to be
participants in the most brutal kind of live
television drama.
It would soon Montes, whose dental office
still is just across Laurel Canyon Boulevard
from the bank, into an emergency triage
doctor for wounded police.
From inside the office, Montes could hear
the gunshots. The patrol officers’ pistols
sounded like toys compared to the
deafening blasts of the robbers’ assault
rifles, Montes said.
Then two injured officers — rookie cop Sgt.
James Zboravan and Detective William Krulac
— scrambled up to his second-floor office.
A dental office turned field hospital
“I had to improvise,” Montes said. “I put
gloves on to deal with the blood.”
The dentist said Zboravan suffered
gunshots to the back, and Krulac had
shrapnel sticking out of his ankle. Montes
remembered using gauze and gel normally
meant for dental surgery to slow the
officers’ bleeding.
The shrapnel sticking out of Krulac’s lower
leg particularly worried Montes. “I told him I
don’t want to take it (the shrapnel) out
because I don’t know if it’s crossing an
artery, vein or bone marrow,” he said.
“He came back Monday with his wife to
thank me, with the shard still in his ankle,”
Montes went on. “If I had taken it out, he
would have bled to death because the
(blood) clotting would have not worked.”
Zboravan was amazed that Montes didn’t
hesitate to help. “I am just grateful for his
bravery, his selflessness,” he said. “He didn’t
have to open his doors to us. He could see
what was happening because he had a 180
degree view from his office.”
Today Zboravan has two degenerated discs
in his back — something to remember the
shootout by, he said.
With the help of the dentist, first responders
and others, all 12 injured police officers and
eight civilians survived the carnage.
The gunmen didn’t. Phillips died first, in a
sickening moment that was broadcast live.
In news footage, Phillips can be seen
walking down a side street randomly firing
a pistol, then getting shot in the hand and
losing his grip on the gun.
“He drops it, picks it up, put the gun under
his chin and presses the trigger,” Massa
explained.
“As he goes down, an unknown uniformed
patrol officer fires at him and hits him in the
upper torso, through the side, misses his
armored vest and severs his spine.”
Phillips dropped to the ground, dead. It was
unclear which bullet killed him.
The final confrontation
Later, the trio of SWAT members who
scrambled to get there from the police
academy squared off with Matasareanu.
Both sides used vehicles as shields.
Massa remembered being worried that the
gunman would come around and shoot all
three of them. “I see his feet,” he said,
recounting his thought process in that
moment.
“I’m going to do what I can to put him
down. I shoot and hit him two or three
times in the ankle, underneath the cars,
which drops him.”
While Massa and his SWAT partners were
laying “prone out” and aiming their guns at
Matasareanu, he says they hit the robber 28
times, until he stopped shooting. The three
SWAT team members rushed to
Matasareanu, who could be seen on TV in a
fetal position, breathing heavily, lying
among streams of blood pouring from his
wounds.
Massa removed the ski mask the gunman
had been wearing. “Why don’t you just put
a round through my head?” Massa
remembered him saying. The two
exchanged a few words, then Massa cuffed
him and turned him over to the detectives,
the SWAT officer said.
There were shell casings strewn
everywhere like confetti, holes in the bank’s
walls and gouges in sidewalk, Massa
recalled.
Matasareanu would bleed to death 56
minutes later. His family sued the LAPD
afterward, arguing that police “murdered”
the 30-year-old by not providing him with
medical aid. The case ended in a mistrial and
was later dismissed, the AP reported.
By the day’s end, more than 2,000 rounds
had been fired — more than half of them
by the robbers. The Battle Of North
Hollywood would go on to inspire a TV
movie and a Megadeth song, titled “44
Minutes” for the length of the shootout. |
Re: The Movie 44 Minutes Was A True Life Event by subtlemee(f): 6:33pm On May 23, 2017 |
Interesting 1 Like |
Re: The Movie 44 Minutes Was A True Life Event by dingbang(m): 6:42pm On May 23, 2017 |
Seen the movie... That's when I first knew the word "rebels".. I wonder why we call them militants here |
(1) (Reply)
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