E-mail updates
Follow on Twitter
Subscribe to RSSUpdated at 9:19 p.m. ET: A Lakeside, Calif. man confronted about alleged child porn opened fire inside his apartment, shooting and injuring two deputies before shooting himself, according to the man’s girlfriend.
The girlfriend told NBC San Diego that she was getting her two daughters ready for school when she found pornographic pictures of her boyfriend and her two daughters engaged in sex acts on his cell phone. The suspect has been identified as Daniel Robert Witczak, 30.
The woman headed to the sheriff’s office, showed them the photos and called the suspect on a deputy-tapped phone line to confront him.
Her boyfriend told her that he planned to sell the photos for $50,000 to a child porn site.
The couple had been dating a year, the woman said, who added that her boyfriend was unemployed. She said he planned to support them with the money he would have made with the photos.
Read full coverage at NBCSanDiego.com
Deputies, including a child abuse detective, entered the apartment complex to confront the suspect while the woman and her daughters waited outside. The woman said that after the deputies stormed the apartment, her boyfriend shot the two deputies with a high-powered rifle and then shot himself.
Both deputies were transported to Sharp Memorial Hospital, KPBS.org reported. Lt. Duncan Fraser of the sheriff's office said at a press conference that both men were in surgery.
One patient arriving to a Sharp Memorial Hospital was shirtless on the first gurney coming out of the Lakeside Fire District paramedics van. That ambulance was followed by another carrying a victim covered by medical cloth.
The suspect was transported to Scripps Mercy Hospital, according to a hospital source. His former employer told NBC News that he had been employed as a mechanic but was fired after a week because he was unreliable.
The shooting occurred at Ashwood and Mapleview streets just south of the Lakeside Rodeo Grounds, said Lt. Mike Munsey of the San Diego County Sheriff's Department.
Resident Jodi Davis, who lives across the street from where the shooting occurred, said she heard between 12 and 18 shots.
“Multiple shots, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang,” Davis said. “I said, 'Oh my gosh -- those are gunshots!'"
She said the police ordered her and her neighbors back into their apartments.
Nearby El Capitan High School went into lockdown; students were dismissed at 1:20 p.m.
NBC San Diego reporters at the scene said officers responded from agencies throughout San Diego County.
More content from NBCNews.com:
- Gray wolf pack in Wash. state will be shot dead after preying on cattle
- Juvenile murderer ruling reopens 'traumatic wounds' for families
- Video: Exonerated man set free after 19 years in prison
- 'Dangerous' Mississippi prison escapee captured in Georgia
- Education Nation: Starkly different visions from Obama, Romney
- Teen picked for homecoming court as prank felt like 'piece of trash'
Follow US News from NBCNews.com on Twitter and Facebook
Leave a Comment:
They should have skipped the hospital and thrown his ass in jail, no big loss if this POS dies!
Misleading headline. If the photos were of the suspect having sex with a minor, then he was not being confronted for child porn. He was being confronted for child RAPE. That would be the top count, and the fact that he planned to sell photos of his crime is secondary to that top charge.
Notice the article says the police stormed the apartment. I reasonably assume they did not enter by knocking but rather by breaking in. They should be charged with breaking and entering, home invasion, and attempted murder. I'll bet the suspect did not shoot himself but was shot by the cops. Don't believe everything the police tell you. The man acted in self-defense.
I was wondering how long it would take you to chime in. Never a suprise Eddie. I could have written your response without even reading the story. No matter what the facts are, if cops are involved...they are wrong. You are a real piece of work EDDIE
who lets a worthless shat with no job move in with her girls, hope he dies soon and the deputies are okay
i'd like the death penalty for this person,i don't care if nobody died,he did two terrible things,molest his daughters and shot two cops,instant death,oh or are you libreals feeling sorry for the jerk....
Maybe she needed someone to babysit the kids when she went to work, and he was a willing babysitter.
Too many idiots on this blog:
Why shoot the cops?
Why did she call him?
How did she find pics getting the daughters ready for school?
WOW...just LMAO and ...WOW@allthetards
who cares how or why she found them, the sad part that seems to be forgotten is the lifelong hell these two poor girls will live with! sorry to hear about the deputies my heart and prayers go out to them and thier families ( yes thats PRAYERS to THE LORD GOD ALMIGHTY )as far as the BF thank you for removing youself from the world!!!
Poorly planed and executed who ever was in charge should be fired. The mom was out and the kids were out and safe on reason to do a dynamic entry. They could have taken him any time this is not t.v. they should know better.
did you even read the article? So many CSI viewers on here. Until you know the facts, you are just another arm chair quarterback.
Now if only we could get more child abusers to turn a gun on themselves
What is(was) the perp's name?
Do you plan to send a condolence note fo flowers? Perv!
Whatever his name was, it wasnt nearly as cool as.....Blamo
"Deputies accompanied by the woman and her two daughters went to the apartment complex to confront the suspect."
Take a course in reading comprehension at your 4-H center. The deputies confronted the suspect, not the mom and kid. They might have been 2 blocks away in a police car. Amazing how experts here can decide who's right or wrong from hundreds or thousands of miles away.
This is why porn is so dangerous, whether entertaining yourself with multiple partners, orgies, children, animals, etc. It starts out subtle with looking at pictures, and then it becomes an addiction. After that, all morals and values are throw out the window and the only satisfaction is when it's acted out. Sometimes it ends in murder so you're not discovered. Porn, just like drug addiction, will ruin every relationship you have and eventually destroy you from the inside out.
Yes, PORN-------------------------->Murder. Direct connection every time. That's why we have over 20 million murders every year from the depraved gentlemen looking at the porn. SIGH....
Oneman,
I totally agree with you 1000% percent. It's a sick habbit.
Onemanonewomanmarriage
Name says it all....WHIPPED. I bet you cut holes in bedsheets when you have sex so you dont see each other naked.
I am hopeful the deputies recover quickly.....as for the p.o.s. that took the pictures.....i hate it that he got off so easy. I hope that he burns in Hell. There has to be the ultimate punishment for any of these sick bastards that are caught with this stuff....and it has to be quick.
I'm sure he was shouting, "From my cold dead hands!" as he was firing.
Quite an upstanding citizen. Arrested by Sheriff's Deputies on August 22 for [273.5(A) PC - INF CORP INJ:SPOUSE/COHAB]. Not sure what it is but sounds like an issue with the GF. Wonder why she stayed with him and supported him?
Coward! All pervs need to be thrown in jail and rot forever. You disgusting sickos have NO purpose on Earth whatsoever! TRUST me..
Lockdown a school, evacuate the area, call in county-wide reinforcements when the perp is caged inside an apt. with no way out. US police have become fascist drama queens. Over the top responses like a military invasion. Using better adult judgement, they likely could have avoided a shootout.
Sick dumbass deserved to di. So yall should all should shoot yourselves if you're that stupid.
I wonder what the NRA would say about this individual's right to own a gun. If someone is engaging in illegal sex acts to produce child porn for profit, is he still fit to possess firearms? I think we all know what the NRA's answer would be.
Sounds like she was in on it.
The alleged perp was trying to lift himself out of the Romney-condemned 47%.
He chose a completely unacceptable way to do it, but I can see that he would want to avoid disapproval by Mittsy's backers.
A Republican victory at the Presidential and Congressional levels would lead to more of this, as well as an increase in survival prostitution. People without jobs and the hope of jobs and social safety nets will do whatever they must to survive.
Dont worry the 47% can work at all the new Romney factories (if they move to China) making airplane windows that roll down.
I hope the two officers recover and it is nothing too serious, but as far as the boyfriend goes, this is the best thing that could have happened to him. Why? If being unemployed means, looking into doing child pornography with your girlfriends two daughters, then this so-called enterprising young man got his "just desserts"!
Please take the kids from this woman! At least, temporarily!
Its tough being a single mom and you can never truly know the man you are with, BUT...
there is something off about this woman letting this man into her home considering just how completely disfunctional he was. I also am troubled by what he said to her when she confronted him about the child porn. Its suspicious that he felt she might respond positvely to the explanation that they could get money using the kids {$50K on a kiddie porn site}.
CPS- needs to assign a monitor/case worker to watch the mother. She is ify. Mayby not as much as this piece of filth thought she was. But pedophiles have a wierd radar for certain mothers who are "open".
Free
Your an idiot. The woman did exactly the right thing when she discovered the photos. Unless her girls told her she would have no idea what was going on, however she is either a snoop or she suspected something was going on.
What are you suggesting, that every woman with an unemployed man living with her call CPS? The only thing the article said was that he was fired from a job for missing work. You call that dysfunctional?
I guess you can identify phediphiles on site? Quite a talent. Perhaps you should seek a career in law enforcement.
Hopefully the chester will die in the hospital and it will be just one gone a whole bunch more to go and if not, the inmates in prison will have fun busting this @!$%# stain's skull open once they catch word of what he's in for and give him a flying lesson over the rail down a few stories onto the concrete. stories like this anger me to no end.
I hope he lives and has all his senses. That way he can experience everything the other inmates do to him. Pedophiles are the lowest of the low in prison.
This theory doesn't ring true to me anymore? When I think what is in prison now, other pedophiles, etc. why should I really think that the prison population would take this guy out?
Criminals often are intelligent and conniving. They pick their prey carefully.
The mother is this case did everything she should had done, yet is criticized. There is a rough row to hoe. I hope she and her kids come through this intact mentally.
I divorced my physically abusive husband when my child was 1. I dated 2 men. None of them ever moved into my house or me theirs. They were never left alone with my child. My life was my child and work. The first man was a good man. He moved several hundreds of miles away and wanted me to move with him. We had only been dating a couple of months and I just could not up root my child, leave my home, leave my job and give up my independence to see where it would all go. The second man I had known for years through work. But after dating him I didn't like how his family treated his sister in laws child(not his brother's child). He mention that the child didn't sit with the family to eat, for instance. Yup, I was done with him. He was bitter and nasty after I broke up with him. I definitely did the right thing. My child never saw men jumping in and out of my house or bed.
My son is 29, independently employed, self sufficent since 19. He has boughten his first house. I suspect he wil be marrying in the new future.
For me, no marriage no trust. Life is difficult enough without trying to figure out the person that interest you is a sadist, pedophile, thief, etc..