It wasn’t the first time Falls Roving Anti-Crime Unit Officer Rick Fleck had responded to a call of a “man with a gun” or “shots fired.”
Yet as he and partner Nick Granto and Narcotics Lt. Kelly Rizzo turned on to South Avenue in the early morning hours of Feb. 7, 2009, Fleck didn’t realize he was going into a firefight.
As Fleck testified to the six man, six woman Niagara County Court jury hearing the case against accused gunman Adam Hamilton on Tuesday morning, he told the panel he had seen Traffic Officer Walt Nichols and K-9 Officer Mike Bird go down the street just ahead of him. Then he heard a gunshot.
“It sounded like a small-caliber weapon,” Fleck said.
Seeing a muzzle flash directed toward Nichols’ patrol SUV, Fleck jumped from the unmarked police car he was in, even as Granto tried to bring the vehicle to a stop on the snow covered and icy street. As he ran toward Nichols’ and Bird’s cars, stopped in front of him, Fleck was suddenly a target himself.
Fleck told the jury he heard a shotgun blast and felt the pellets from the shell pass over his head.
“It felt like it was right on top of me,” he said. “It felt like it went right through my hair.”
Diving behind Bird’s car, Fleck said he took cover behind the engine block on the passenger side and trained his handgun on a suspect located on the porch of 1028 South Ave. He fired nine rounds.
“I fired in the direction of the muzzle flash, toward the east side of the porch, by a pillar,” Fleck told the jurors.
He said the suspect was illuminated by the muzzle flash from the shotgun he was wielding. Fleck said he doesn’t know if it was one of his rounds, or one fired by Nichols or Bird, but the gunman slumped forward, falling onto his stomach on the porch and the sound of gunfire ceased.
Up on the porch, Fleck said he and Granto found Hamilton with a sawed-off shotgun and sawed-off rifle underneath him. A large hunting knife lay next to the suspect.
“You believe (Hamilton) was the one who shot at you,” defense attorney Joel Daniels asked Fleck.
“He was the only one on the porch with a gun,” the officer replied.
Hamilton, 35, 2718 22nd St., is charged with two counts of attempted first-degree murder, a single charge of attempted second-degree murder and one count of aggravated criminal contempt in the shooting of Nichols, Bird and his estranged girlfriend Stephanie Turk.
Fleck and Granto said, in addition to Hamilton, they found Turk slumped on the porch, suffering from what appeared to be multiple gunshot wounds.
Testifying on the fifth day of Hamilton’s trial, Granto said when he turned onto South Avenue he too heard a gunshot.
“As soon as I turned the corner, I could see Officer Nichols’ driver’s side window explode,” Granto said. “After the initial blast of the windows, I could see a muzzle flash coming from Officer Nichols’ car.”
Nichols had previously told the jury that after being shot as he stepped from his SUV, he was able to draw his gun and fire back at Hamilton.
Granto said he then saw multiple muzzle flashes from the porch and took cover behind a tree, before running over to where Fleck was by Bird’s patrol car. The RAC officer said he saw Fleck fire at gunman and then the suspect fell.
Prosecutors said they will present testimony from medical doctors later today and could rest their case by Thursday.
Courts
COURTS: Fellow officers detail February firefight
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