Felons fall.

On May 11 at about l0 p.m. in East Oakland, California, 17-year-old Tommy Ray Spencer and 23-year-old Juan Gonzalez entered a liquor store to rob it. They ordered the store manager to the floor, and Spencer threatened a clerk at the store's counter with a pistol. Then, according to the San Francisco Chronicle, Spencer shot at the clerk twice, and so the clerk pulled a gun that was on hand because the store had been robbed twice in the previous six months and shot back, wounding Spencer.

The two robbers fled. The Oakland Tribune described what happened next: "Spencer was wounded before he and Gonzalez ran from the store empty-handed to where they had parked their getaway car a short distance away. Spencer collapsed on the pavement near the car. Gonzalez took the gun from him and also went through his pockets, taking his money and identification.... Gonzalez then fired some shots at the store before fleeing in the car, leaving Spencer behind. Spencer was pronounced dead at the scene."

A store employee told the Chronicle, "In this case, if we didn't have a gun, we were going to get shot and maybe killed."

When police identified Spencer's body, they quickly zeroed in on Spencer's neighbor Gonzalez as his accomplice. But Gonzalez wasn't going to be taken easily. He shot at a police officer who tried to arrest him at his apartment complex, narrowly missing, and fled. But he was soon located again, and a special police team made an arrest.