What Happened

On Thursday, March 12, 2026, two El Dorado County Sheriff's Office deputies were shot on Mountain View Drive in Camino, California. According to CBS Sacramento, deputies were called shortly before 7:30 a.m. after reports that a man had fired at a Pacific Gas & Electric crew replacing a power pole. A contract worker was injured.

When deputies and SWAT arrived, the man barricaded himself inside a home. South Tahoe Now reported that deputies and SWAT spent about three hours trying to de-escalate before an officer-involved shooting. Two deputies and the suspect were shot.

According to South Tahoe Now, both deputies were taken to a hospital by ambulance in stable condition, and the suspect was airlifted to a regional hospital. KOLO reported that the PG&E contract worker was treated and released the same day. By March 18, the sheriff's office said both deputies had been released and were "on the road to recovery," according to KOLO. The sheriff's office said the deputies were "swiftly extracted from the shooting scene."

The El Dorado County District Attorney's Office is leading a multi-agency investigation with Placerville Police, South Lake Tahoe Police, and the sheriff's office, under the county's critical incident protocol. The suspect was taken into custody at the hospital. Charges are allegations until proven in court.

What is not public: where the deputies were hit, the sequence of the gunfire, what care was given before the ambulance, and how long extraction took. We won't guess.

The Lesson

These are general principles, not findings about this response.

A long standoff is time to build the medical plan. When a barricade lasts hours, there is time to stage an ambulance at a known point, name who will pull a wounded officer out, and decide which vehicle or cover will be used to do it. Getting a wounded officer to care without waiting for the scene to go fully cold is the outcome every barricade plan should be built to produce.

Plan for more than one casualty from the start. This scene began with an injured civilian worker and ended with two deputies and a suspect shot. The C-TECC TECC Guidance frames early care in phases: in Direct Threat Care the priorities are the threat, moving to safety, and "managing massive hemorrhage utilizing tourniquets." Once the casualty is in cover, Indirect Threat Care moves to a full MARCHE assessment. With several patients, that means triage and a clear handoff to EMS.

The Joint Trauma System's Damage Control Resuscitation CPG states that "hemorrhage is the leading cause of preventable death on the battlefield." That is military guidance, written for combat casualty care. For civilian law enforcement it is context, not a protocol, but the priority carries over: stop major bleeding first, then move.

What Your Agency Should Do Now

  • Write casualty extraction into every barricade plan: who pulls, what cover or armored vehicle they use, and where the handoff point to EMS is.
  • Stage EMS and air medical early on long standoffs, with a landing zone identified before it's needed.
  • Assign a medical lead on the perimeter whose only job is casualties, not containment.
  • Drill a scene with multiple patients, including a civilian hurt before police arrived, so triage and transport decisions are practiced.

Sources