Riverside Officer’s Death a Reminder of Risk in Police Work

The call that wound up killing Riverside Police Det. Doug Jacobs sounded so easy when it came in: Woman refuses to turn her music down.

“This is not one of those situations when you think an officer is going to lose his or her life,” Riverside Police Lt. Ed McBride said Monday. “Sometimes that’s what makes a police officer’s job very dangerous. You just don’t know what other people are going to do.”

Jacobs, 30, who went to assist a fellow officer who was having trouble arresting the woman Saturday afternoon, died from a gunshot to the head, leaving behind a wife and two children, including an infant daughter.

Parthenia Carr, who lives on the top floor of a residence in the 3100 block of Lemon Street, refused to turn down her radio, McBride said. When the first officer on the scene, Ben Baker, tried to arrest the woman, her son, Claude Carr, 31, came out and said: “You’re not going to take my mom,” McBride said.

It was the fourth time police had responded to a loud music complaint at the residence in two months. Baker put out a call for assistance, which brought Jacobs, a six-year veteran of the Police Department.

As the two officers confronted the mother and son, another of Parthenia Carr’s sons, Steve Woodruff, 37, who lived in the downstairs unit, came outside with a weapon and fired upward twice at the officers, McBride said.

“He made a statement: ‘Leave my mother alone.’ So we assume he was firing at the officers,” McBride said.

Baker fired back at Woodruff but did not hit him, McBride said. One of Woodruff’s shots hit Jacobs, who was pronounced dead at Riverside Community Hospital.

Woodruff was arrested on suspicion of murder; no bail was set. Claude Carr was arrested on suspicion of interfering with a police officer trying to make an arrest and for a parole violation. Police are still investigating whether to arrest the mother, McBride said.

Jacobs married three years ago, and he had a 10-year-old stepson and a 7-month-old daughter. He was a Los Angeles County deputy sheriff for five years before becoming a police officer.

“This is devastating,” said McBride. “This is an officer who was exemplary. One of those people who would help anybody.”

Even as a child, Jacobs wanted to be a police officer, and he had a goal to teach criminal justice college courses, said Officer Heath Baker, his best friend and the brother of Officer Ben Baker.

Heath Baker and Jacobs worked the same shifts patrolling downtown Riverside. They also spent time together outside of work, watching football, fishing or relaxing with each other’s families.

“It hasn’t hit me yet,” Heath Baker said. “But the first day I go back to work and Doug’s not there, it’s gonna hit me pretty hard.”

Funeral services for Jacobs will be at 10 a.m. Thursday at the Harvest Christian Fellowship Church in Riverside.