The Campbell Reporter

Cover Story

Photograph by Jacqueline Ramseyer

On the Job: Russ Patterson, joined the Campbell Police Department in 1980. He discovered law enforcement as a career when he joined the Campbell Explorer program as a teenager.

Over and Out

Police captain retires excited about future

By Moryt Milo

When Russ Patterson clocked in for his four to midnight shift at the Campbell Police Department in April 1981, he had no idea the evening would culminate in a shootout that could have ended his career.

Patterson, at the time 26 years old, had been with the Campbell Police Department for a year. That evening he was assisting Santa Clara police on a murder case. A man suspected of a homicide in Santa Clara was located at a Campbell residence near Hazel Avenue and San Tomas Aquino Road. Patterson was outside with the Santa Clara police when he noticed a car drive by with a rag sticking out of the gas tank, obscuring part of the license plate. When the driver drove past the officers a second time Patterson says, "It looked suspicious."

He got into his patrol car and followed the man to Virginia Avenue, where he made a car stop. From there 10 minutes turned into a lifetime.

Instinctively Patterson knew to call for backup before approaching the driver. When the man got out of his car, Patterson immediately noticed a knife in a sheath strapped to his leg.

He ordered the man to take it off and place the knife and sheath on the car, and that's when all hell broke loose on Virginia where it curbs into Budd.

As the man took off the knife, he reached into his vest and pulled out a semi-automatic handgun.

"This guy was a real wacko," Patterson says. "He was layered in clothing, and said he was part of the military police and to leave him alone. I ran to the rear of my car, and he ran to the front of his and started shooting at me."

The young officer was caught in a shootout with backup on the way. Patterson returned fire, hitting the man's windshield and car. When backup arrived, one car blocked in the shooter's vehicle, and another parked behind Patterson's patrol car. But backup wasn't enough to persuade the man to surrender. He hurled a hand-grenade simulator--a weapon akin to a huge firecracker--at Patterson's car. It landed between the two patrol cars, rolled under the second vehicle and blew up.

"I was outside the car and kind of in the open. I tried to get behind a mobile home parked in a driveway for protection," he says.

As Patterson attempted to get out of the line of fire, the shooter, who had been crouched on the passengers side of his car, saw him move, sprung back up and fired a sawed-off shotgun in Patterson's direction. The shotgun, loaded with birdshot, hit Patterson's car window and vehicle, and the "wadding" and some pellets hit Patterson in the shoulder.

"I was knocked down and thought, 'What the hell happened?' In those days we didn't wear a vest," Patterson says.

The shooter was finally subdued when the police started shooting under that car and hit him in the legs. Patterson sustained only minor injuries.

Although he retells the story nonchalantly 25 years later, the night after the shooting, one of his closest friends, Chris Milosovich, who started on the Campbell police force the same time as Patterson, had his good friend over for dinner to help calm things down.

"When someone has a shotgun, you don't know what is coming out," Milosovich says. "There are a lot of different loads they can put in there."

Milosovich, a sergeant in the Campbell Police Department, and Patterson have been fast friends that stems back to their days in the police academy. The two were hired in March 1980 by former Campbell police chief and current City Councilman Don Burr.

Patterson retired on Dec. 27 as a captain in the agency after a 30-year career in law enforcement.

Current Campbell Police Chief David Gullo says, "In this job to make it to the end in public safety and law enforcement is a huge success; it's a rarity. It's not something we see all the time. Spending 30 years on the job can do a lot to you."

Joining the ranks

Patterson says he knew early on what he had signed up for. He had gotten a taste of law enforcement, policing and the darker side of humanity as a teenager in the Explorer program.

He grew up off Bucknall Road in West San Jose and went to Prospect High School. There, some of his friends had joined the Explorer program when Campbell established it in 1972. The Explorers is a way of introducing youth between the ages of 15 and 21 to police work. The program is affiliated with Boy Scouts of America.

Patterson says, "I really didn't know what I wanted to do at the time and thought this might be kind of neat to see what its like to be a cop."

It was the ride-alongs that convinced him to make law enforcement a career. He saw excitement on the job, and every day was different. And he wouldn't be behind a desk, although he jokes now that that's exactly where he has been for the last 10 years.

But at the time, Patterson says, "When I saw what was really going on out there, I thought, 'This is pretty cool. This is something I could make a career out of,' and that's just what I did."

Patterson was the first one in his family to become a police officer. He is the oldest of three. He has two younger sisters.

"We were a typical middle-class family," Patterson says, "My mother stayed home, and my dad worked as an insurance adjuster and sold garage door openers."

He says his family was "leery" about his career choice.

"At the time my parents weren't very excited about it," he says, "but later they were proud."

His love of the job inspired his brother-in-law, Larry Orlando, to join the Gilroy police and his nephew, Brandon Orlando, to become an officer with the San Jose police.

He was also an inspiration to Campbell's current police chief.

"Russ was instrumental in my career. He was here in the Explorers and was one of the individuals who really guided me during my first years," says Gullo, who joined the Explorers at 15.

Patterson was a supervisor in the program and Gullo says, "I was junior to him, and he gave me all kinds of opportunities here. He kept me going, and I appreciated that from the beginning."

When Gullo was promoted to police chief in 1996 by former Campbell City Manager Mark Ochenduszko, Gullo would be the one to promote his former mentor Patterson from acting captain to captain in 1997.

1970s and beyond

When Patterson chose to enter law enforcement in the 1970s, the climate was extremely competitive. It was not uncommon to have 250 to 300 people applying for one job in the field. In contrast, today agencies are lucky to get 50 people applying, Patterson says.

Back then serious candidates looked for any edge that would help them stand out. Patterson's experience as an Explorer was a plus.

"Russ came to us young and enthusiastic," says Burr, who became Campbell police chief in 1971. "He really wanted to make an impression on how mature he was for his age and really wanted to do the job. And, he wanted to do it for the city of Campbell."

Patterson had worked dispatch at the Campbell agency, and then became a police officer with the West Valley College Police Department for 2 1/2 years. But his heart was in Campbell, and that's where he wanted to be.

What stood out for Burr, in addition to Patterson's enthusiasm, was his basic knowledge of right and wrong, and his desire to serve the Orchard City.

"Oh boy, you could tell he was sincere and really wanted in to the business," Burr says.

Once on the job, Patterson believed nothing was insurmountable.

Back then, according to Patterson, "the only tools were your voice, a baton, your hands and a gun if you needed to shoot someone. That was it."

During the next three decades, Patterson would witness a slew of law enforcement changes from the local to national level. The Campbell Fire Department would be folded into Santa Clara County in 1993; Kevlar vests and Tasers would become part of police gear; the nation would experience 9-11, birthing homeland security; and emergency preparedness would become an entire industry in California and the nation.

As he matured on the job, his affable personality made him the logical pick to become the public information officer for the Campbell Police Department and to develop the city's emergency preparedness standards.

When Campbell agreed to turn over its fire operations to the Santa Clara County Fire District, emergency preparedness became an integrated process between fire and police. That required taking emergency preparedness to the next level, and Gullo decided Patterson could accomplish the task.

"I looked at Russ and said, 'Russ you're it.' He looked at me like, 'Are you crazy?'" Gullo says. "Yet like everything else, Russ has done, he has taken it on 110 percent, and he did a great job."

In fact, not only has Patterson helped developed an emergency preparedness program for Campbell that rivals larger cities, he has become an expert in the field, applying his expertise at the county and state level.

Campbell City Councilman Dan Furtado, who worked closely with Patterson on the city's emergency preparedness plan, says, "Russ looked for practical solutions when it came to problem-solving, and people willingly worked with him. Russ understood we needed an integrated approach."

He became the emergency manager for Campbell in 1996 and in 2001 was appointed president of the Emergency Managers Association, which brings cities throughout the county together to coordinate disaster management systems.

When Jim Wollbrinck, security and emergency preparedness specialist for the San Jose Water Company, went looking for an individual to help roll out the water company's emergency operations plan, Wollbrinck knew of only two individuals capable of the task. One was Patterson; the other was Marsha Hovey, emergency services coordinator for Cupertino.

Wollbrinck says Patterson was "instrumental" in assisting his staff in the Standardized Emergency Management System (SEMS), which became the state standard after the Oakland Hills fire in October 1991. Patterson assisted with the public information officer training, and he helped develop the water company's emergency operations plan.

"He did this while on the Campbell Police Department," Wollbrinck says. "This was a public service on his part. We are the water utility that services Campbell, and he was concerned we could handle an emergency effectively in his area. So he volunteered his time, effort and energy to help us out."

That sense of selflessness is hallmark Patterson.

"Russ came from the era when the job was your career, and it was everything. So you put your all into it," Gullo says.

His friends, co-workers in the police department and peers in emergency management say its his quirky personality blended with a no-nonsense, positive attitude that has allowed him to retire with his health, his sense of humor and the ability to begin a new career in the private sector in emergency management planning and training on a statewide level.

"He never looked at the glass half empty; it was always half full, and he tried to fill that glass up as much as he could and as quickly as he could," Gullo says.

Now living over the hill in Scotts Valley, Patterson has no intention of slowing down. His list includes teaching, running emergency plans, involvement with animal services and getting 2-11 services--a new plan that will help people with social service needs--off the ground. There may even be a political career in his future.

Milosovich is just beginning to feel the effects of his close friend's absence at work and says its "bizarre" not to see him after working together for more than 25 years.

But as tough as it was to let go, Patterson says he was ready to say goodbye, even though he could never have imagined working anywhere else.

"I've heard from some folks you know when it's time to go," he says. "I could have stayed one more year; not me; It's just the right time."