By Heather Ratcliffe, The St. Louis Post-Dispatch
It was routine police work Tuesday morning when a Bellefontaine Neighbors officer called for help after watching a suspicious driver speed off.
One municipality over, the only Riverview officer on duty at 7:15 a.m., Brad Schultz Jr., heard that call and gunned his patrol car south on Lilac Avenue to catch up. That was routine, too.
A deadly twist came when somebody coming off Scenic Drive started to make a left turn into Schultz’s path, police said. Schultz swerved the patrol car, a Chevrolet Impala, to avoid a collision. It clipped a utility pole, flipped onto its roof, bumped a vacant house and caught fire.
Schultz, 29, was thrown into the yard near the wreckage, where he died, despite attempts by neighbors to help him. No one else was injured.
It was the first line-of-duty death for the Police Department in Riverview, where about 3,000 people live in less than 1 square mile just north of the St. Louis city limit.
“We’re only a 10-man department and a tightknit group,” said Capt. Jeffrey Dominguez. “We know each other very well.”
He called Schultz an “all-around good guy.”
Dominguez added: “He was well-liked by everyone here at the department and (by) the citizens. There’s nothing any of us could say bad about Brad.”
Residents punctuated the point by leaving flowers outside City Hall.
Schultz is survived by his parents, a brother and his fiancee, officials said. Family members knew Schultz was working and got the terrible news when they called the station after hearing news reports about the crash.
He and his fiancee bought a home in Florissant more than a year ago, fellow officers said.
Schultz graduated from Riverview Gardens High School in 1994. Many officers in north St. Louis County first met Schultz when he worked at a gas station in the area, Dominguez said.
He began his career in law enforcement as a Police Explorer in Bellefontaine Neighbors, then became a jailer at the Ferguson Police Department.
Schultz graduated from the St. Charles Police Academy in June 2000. He joined the Riverview police as a reserve officer in December 2000 and then as a full-time officer in May 2001. He received a chief’s commendation in October 2002 for catching a car thief in a foot pursuit.
He was killed helping in someone else’s pursuit of a car thief.
Something about a blue Impala drew the attention of a Bellfontaine Neighbors officer, police said, who turned on his warning lights. The car sped off, but the officer got close enough to read its license plate before his supervisor told him not to chase it.
The vehicle was not yet listed in police computers as stolen, but investigators said they determined it had been taken Monday in Northwoods. Police found the car later Tuesday, abandoned in St. Louis near Fairground Park.
St. Louis County police are investigating Schultz’s crash. They would not speculate on how fast Schultz was going, whether he wore his seat belt or if he used his warning signals. Accident reconstructionists removed the wrecked car’s “black box” data recorder, saying they hoped to learn those things from it.
Police said witnesses included two children waiting for a school bus. Some witnesses said Schultz’s flashing lights were on.
“We know and love this man,” said Valerie Kirkwood, who lives near the crash scene. “He’ll mess with you just to have a laugh. He pulled me over and said, ‘April Fool’s,’ and it wasn’t even April.”
Neighbor Tia Johns said she heard a loud blast, then another as the car slammed into the house. “It sounded just like bombs going off,” said Johns, who lives about a block away.
The impact with the utility pole knocked down lines that left the area temporarily without power.