text: Cleveland Elementary School shooting On January 17, 1989, the Stockton Police Department received a threat against Cleveland Elementary School from an unknown person. Later that day, Patrick Purdy, who was later found to be mentally ill, opened fire on the school's playground with a semi-automatic rifle, killing five children, all Cambodian or Vietnamese refugees, and wounding 29 others, and a teacher, before taking his own life. The Cleveland Elementary School shooting received national news coverage and is sometimes referred to as the Cleveland School massacre.
  Budget crisis
  The city cut its police force by more than 20% during the 2008 subprime mortgage crisis, but voters approved a sales tax on November 5, 2013, that provided funds to hire an additional 120 police officers.
  Bank robbery
  On July 16, 2014, officers responded to an armed bank robbery, which resulted in the four perpetrators taking three hostages and leading them on an hour-long high-speed pursuit. Over the course of the car chase, one suspect fired over 100 rounds from an AK-47s at police, disabling 14 police vehicles, including the department's own Lenco BearCat armored personnel carrier. More than 30 officers shot over 600 rounds into the getaway vehicle. Two perpetrators were killed, two hostages were injured, one hostage was killed by police ammunition, and numerous vehicles and other property were damaged or destroyed by the nearly 1,000 rounds of ammunition fired by the robbers and police. The department faced criticism with its handling of the incident in the aftermath.