Son of Shooting Victim to Get $1.4 Million

The city of Los Angeles has reached a tentative $1.4-million settlement with the son of a Woodland Hills man who was fatally shot in 2000 by an off-duty Police Department sergeant.

Sgt. Steven Ulrich opened fire on Christopher Oliver after the movie grip, who had been drinking and taking a prescription drug, plowed his truck into a string of parked cars. An appeals court found that Ulrich had admitted that the truck was partly up on the curb and posed no danger when he fired the fatal shot.

Ulrich, whose lawyers had argued that he fired to protect himself and onlookers from the driver, was cleared of criminal and administrative charges in the shooting. He could not be reached for comment.

Larry Grassini, an attorney for Oliver’s son, Justin, said the truck’s axle had broken before the shooting started.

“The truck was never a threat to anyone. It was already disabled. The fatal shot was fired from the side with no one in the truck’s path,” Grassini said. “One of Chris’ neighbors went berserk and executed him.”

The settlement was reached earlier this month as jury selection got underway in a civil lawsuit over the shooting. Grassini, in a pretrial filing, had told the court: “To date, this ugly chapter in LAPD history has not come to the attention of the community at large. This trial will change all of that.”

According to his attorney, Oliver left his home on Friar Street in Woodland Hills to pick up his son from a friend’s house on the evening of July 24, 2000. On the way to his truck, he re-injured an ankle and took an extra dose of codeine, not noticing the label warning that it could interact with the beer he was drinking.

According to the appeals court, Oliver, with a blood-alcohol level twice California’s legal limit, struck seven cars on Friar and four on Victory Boulevard. His truck came to a stop at Friar and Jackie Avenue, and another driver -- Ron Regan -- pinned the driver’s door with his car.

Ulrich, who lived near the scene, heard the noise, came out of his home and ordered Oliver out of the truck. On a profanity-laced, 34-second tape of Ulrich’s 911 call, he can be heard yelling at Oliver, “Get outta car! Get on the ground!”

Ulrich told investigators that Oliver lurched his vehicle toward him, and that he fired six or seven times through the windshield. He said he then moved to the side of the truck, firing three times through the passenger window.

Oliver, struck in the neck and shoulder, walked away from the vehicle and lay down on the parkway, where he died.

Attorneys for the city, seeking to have the suit dismissed, told the appeals court that Ulrich, seeing the driver trying to rev the engine and place the vehicle in reverse, fired to protect himself and others. They also said Ulrich perceived Oliver, who was clearly drunk, as a fleeing felon.

The appeals court disagreed, saying Ulrich did not have enough information to determine that Oliver was drunk.

Ulrich “admitted that he fired three shots through the passenger window, and that he did not feel that he was in immediate danger when he did so,” the appeals court found. “A portion of the truck was up on the curb when he fired the last three shots, and the onlookers were across the street.”

Jonathan Diamond, a spokesman for the city attorney, said final approval for the settlement would be sought from the City Council in July. He said officials would not comment further.