CHP Officer Shooting Was Most-Read Story of 2012

5) Anthony Banta shot and killed by WCPD
The most recent headline-grabber comes in at number 5. What caused 22-year-old Anthony Banta Jr. to wake up in the middle of the night on Dec. 26 at his Creekside Drive apartment and threaten his roommate? What caused police to shoot Banta when he brandished a knife? The answers to these questions may come in 2013.

4) Teen arrested in fatal Concord crash
A dad and his daughters were out for a bike ride Saturday morning when an SUV hurtled into the intersection of Treat Boulevard and Oak Grove Road in Concord, hopped up on the sidewalk and struck the bikes on April 7. Solaiman Nuri and his 9-year-old daughter Hadessa died; 12-year-old Hannah Nuri survived. The SUV was driven by a Concord teenager, who in October was sentenced to seven years and eight months for vehicular manslaughter; since he was 17 at the time of the crash, he can only be incarcerated legally until he turns 21.

3) Friends of skateboarder want memorial park in his memory
Tucker Hacking, 20, of Walnut Creek suffered a head injury Jan. 27 after falling from his skateboard on a steep stretch of Juanita Drive in Saranap where Lafayette and Walnut Creek come together. He fell into a coma and died two days later at the hospital. The effort to rename Walnut Creek Skate Park in his name ultimately failed.

2) Man jumps onto I-680 from bridge
A 32-year-old man jumped to his death from the freeway overpass at Treat Boulevard onto Interstate 680 a little after 9 a.m. on a Tuesday, Sept. 25. The victim of the apparent suicide was Airnoi Saykosy of Brentwood.

1)
On Sept. 4, CHP Officer Kenyon Youngstrom was making what he thought was a routine traffic stop on the side of I-680 southbound in Alamo. The driver of a Jeep Wrangler, Chris Lacy, 36, of Corning, talked briefly with the officer while sitting in the driver's seat, then pulled a handgun and shot Youngstrom in the head. A few moments later, Lacy was shot and killed himself by another CHP officer. Youngstrom hung in for awhile as family and CHP colleagues gathered at John Muir Medical Center in Walnut Creek, and passed away the next day.