Three months after getting shot by a man while on duty, Clackamas County Deputy Robert Cordova still wonders what he’d say to the stranger if they met face to face.
A bullet from his own gun – wrested away by the suspect – hit Cordova’s right leg and shrapnel damaged his left leg. He couldn’t move his right leg for about a month afterward and still has bits of shrapnel in his other leg, he said.
At 23, Cordova was the youngest of at least six police officers in Oregon shot on duty last year. He hopes to return to work at the end of February and is anxious to get back behind the wheel of a patrol car.
The shooting hasn’t deterred him from continuing in the job he wanted since he was 8 or 9 years old, he told The Oregonian/OregonLive while at the county sheriff’s office headquarters in Clackamas this week.
Cordova said he hopes to understand what motivated the accused shooter. “What would drive someone to think in any kind of reality that’s a good idea?” he said.
Steven Wilson, 40, faces attempted murder and other charges after investigators said he grabbed Cordova’s gun on Nov. 15.
The deputy had responded to a call that a woman hit Wilson while he was lying in the street along Sunnyside Boulevard. Cordova was checking on Wilson’s condition when the man suddenly attacked him, investigators said in court documents.
Cordova also shot and stabbed Wilson in the struggle.
A friend who was on a ride-along with Cordova and passers-by rushed to help the deputy and subdue Wilson until other deputies arrived. Wilson had methamphetamine in his system during the attack, court records show. His criminal history includes 2002 convictions in Clackamas and Columbia counties for fourth-degree assault and a conviction last year in Multnomah County for second-degree theft.
Steven WilsonClackamas County Sheriff’s Office
Cordova said he’s a little nervous about returning to work, but support from colleagues and community members who have expressed their appreciation for the risks officers face on the job has motivated him to put his uniform back on.
“I understood the risks when I signed up,” Cordova said. “Overall, I’m ready to go back. I can’t wait to go back.”
His inspiration for wanting to become a deputy came when his father ran a red light in West Linn more than a decade ago.
A West Linn officer pulled his dad over and Cordova was in in the car with him. The young Cordova was struck by the officer’s politeness. She made time to talk to him and gave him a sticker before leaving, he said.
He doesn’t remember if his dad got a ticket, but he said he’ll always remember how she treated them.
“She was awesome,” Cordova said. “She made me laugh and made sure she didn’t walk away leaving a negative experience with us.”
As he got older, he continued to have an interest in law enforcement. Friends pursuing the same line of work encouraged him to join a cadet program run by the Clackamas County Sheriff’s Office.
At 16, he joined the program, he received training at least once a month over the next five years. Deputies showed him how to conduct traffic stops and other criminal investigations. He also attended community events with deputies during the summer.
At 21, Cordova became a volunteer reserve deputy and after six months applied to become a full-time deputy. After about a year of interviews and medical and physical tests, he got a call in July 2015 offering him the job.
“It was the call of a lifetime,” Cordova said. “It’s something I’d be working for all those years and in a single call it became a reality.”
Cordova was working a 9 p.m. to 7 a.m. traffic patrol shift four days a week when he got shot.
He said he was drinking hot chocolate in his patrol car about a half-hour before his shift was scheduled to end. He was with his friend – a fellow cadet from years before who was considering a law enforcement career.
The emergency call came in to check on a man hit by a car and lying in the lanes of Sunnybrook Boulevard.
Cordova, citing the pending criminal case involving Wilson, declined to discuss specifics about the shooting. Wilson is being held in the Clackamas County Jail on more than $1 million bail.
Cordova said he was able to call his family- he’s the middle of three children — from the hospital to say he was OK and got out the same day, walking on crutches.
Cordova said he’s closer now to the friend who was on the ride-along and is grateful to the others who jumped into the fray to help him. He’s met with some of them briefly since the shooting and thanked them.
“Honestly, I wouldn’t expect anyone out and about minding their own business to hear gunshots and run up to help me,” Cordova said. “You would think the thing they would do is run the opposite way and instead they ran directly to me.”
When he returns to the Sheriff’s Office, Cordova said he plans to continue on patrol. He hopes to one day get on the drug enforcement team and become a contributor to the agency’s cadet program.
“I appreciated the deputies who spent their time helping me get a start, so I figure why not be that person to help other people get a start in this awesome career,” he said.
Cordova said he’ll likely have to renew firearms and other training before going back on patrol. He looks forward to his first cup of hot chocolate back on duty.
— Everton Bailey Jr.
ebailey@oregonian.com
503-221-8343; @EvertonBailey
Our editors found this article on this site using Google and regenerated it for our readers.
