AUTOPSY: GUNMAN SHOT SELF BEFORE LAPD OFFICERS DID.

Byline: Jaxon Van Derbeken Daily News Staff Writer

The gunman who had critically wounded a CHP officer turned his gun upon himself before LAPD officers opened fire on him, an autopsy showed Friday.

The three officers who fired at shooting suspect Terry Parker believed the gunfire was being directed at them, said LAPD Cmdr. Tim McBride.

``(The) officers couldn't afford to wait, and I don't blame them a bit,'' McBride said.

CHP Officer Rafael Casillas, 31, was shot and critically wounded by Parker after officers pursued the 25-year-old suspect to his Granada Hills home early Wednesday morning. Parker had refused to pull over for a speeding violation.

Doctors at Providence Holy Cross Medical Center in Mission Hills operated on Casillas again late Friday for more than two hours to remove bone fragments in his wrist and complete repairs to an abdomen wound.

``Barring any unforeseen circumstances, the officer probably will survive, with the caveat that we're not out of the woods yet,'' Dr. Dante Davies, the surgeon who operated on Casillas, told reporters afterward.

The officer emerged from the operation in critical condition, but his vital signs were stable, hospital spokeswoman Shireen Gandhi-Kozel said.

She said Casillas continued to breathe with the assistance of a ventilator, but family members reported that when awake, he squeezed their hands and gave them a thumbs-up.

Coroner's spokesman Scott Carrier said an autopsy conducted Friday showed that Parker had fired a single round into the roof of his mouth and it had exited from his skull.

Although Parker had inflicted a mortal wound upon himself, he still was breathing when the officers fired, so the death has been ruled as a homicide at the hands of police, Carrier said.

The autopsy showed that officers had fired shotgun and pistol rounds at Parker. Toxicology tests are pending to determine what substances may have been in Parker's blood.

Three officers, aided by police tracking dogs, converged on Parker as he hid in a clump of bushes following the shooting of Casillas. The officers reported seeing a man with a gun emerge from the bushes and fire.

``Just as they get there, as they spread out, a gunshot goes off,'' McBride said. ``They all had their guns drawn; they returned fire immediately.''

Parker had been addicted to crack cocaine for more than a decade and had previous run-ins with officers, who shot him after a police pursuit in 1994. He also had barricaded himself in his Harvest Street home that year and told officers he wanted them to shoot him.

In prison for felony charges stemming from his run-ins with law enforcement, Parker was diagnosed as having dramatic mood swings, according to his father.

He had been given mood-stabilizing drugs, said Hugh Nelson, assistant regional administrator for the state Department of Corrections. He was also given depressant as well as anti-depressant drugs.