A police officer responding to a call from a Citizens on Patrol member about a person acting suspiciously was shot outside an East Berry Street restaurant Thursday afternoon, police said.
The officer, identified as Clifford T. Hankins, 46, of Cleburne, was shot in the lower abdomen.
He was in stable condition Thursday night at John Peter Smith Hospital and is expected to fully recover, police officials said.
The officer radioed that he had been shot as patrons of the restaurant and bystanders rushed to his aid.
"A lot of community members came out to help," Police Chief Jeffrey Halstead said at the hospital. "One [man] placed a blanket beneath the officer so that he would not get burned as he went down on the concrete."
Police said the wounded officer has been on the force for 16 years.
The shooting occurred shortly before 2 p.m. outside Robinson's Bar-B-Que, 1028 E. Berry St., in a commercial area about two blocks east of Interstate 35W.
The Citizens on Patrol member had called about seeing a suspicious person, said Maj. Paul Henderson, a police spokesman.
Charter Cable technician Craig Stevenson was driving past when he saw the officer try to stop a man dressed in a black hoodie and shorts. The man pulled out a gun, Stevenson told the Star-Telegram.
Stevenson heard a gunshot and saw the man in the hoodie run east on East Berry, he said.
Police spokeswoman Sharron Neal said investigators think only the one shot was fired.
As other police officers arrived, witnesses pointed them toward a vacant field next to railroad tracks in the 3200 block of Mississippi Avenue, Henderson said. A man could be seen hiding in a thicket, and officers trained their rifles on him and ordered him out, but he didn't move. Officers went into the brush and wrestled him out without injury, Henderson said.
Police recovered a 9 mm handgun, Henderson said.
The man was returned to the restaurant parking lot in a patrol car and paramedics checked him for possible heat exhaustion.
The temperature was 99 degrees at 2 p.m. and 100 by 3 p.m.
Within minutes, officers drove away with the suspect.
"We feel confident that he will be charged with attempted capital murder," Henderson said.
Police late Thursday identified the man as Joe Nathan Haywood, 25.
Show of support
"This hit a lot of our younger officers very, very hard," Halstead said. "But we hold onto each other. The first thing we did when we got to the hospital was gather in a circle, hold hands and pray for this officer."
Hankins' family was with him in the hospital Thursday, police said.
"He's not out of the woods yet," Henderson said. "He still has a long recovery ahead of him."
Members of the Black and Brown Caucus and Community Leadership Coalition gathered around Halstead as he spoke to reporters outside the hospital Thursday. Luther Perry, a member of the group and a retired police officer, said they wanted to show support for police.
"We want to ask our communities to remain calm and allow the police to stand tall and do their job," Perry said. "The citizens are outraged that this could happen in their community."
McClatchy-Tribune News Service
