For reporters, police scanners provide background buzz to the newsroom, an endless drone of beeps, static and monotone voices speaking police code.

Through all that audio snarl, certain words, sounds, and tension pop through and grab your attention, like "shots fired" or the quickened breath of an officer running after suspects while shouting both the description and direction of the people he's pursuing.

As I prepared to head home last night a little after 9 p.m., what I heard over the scanner was chilling and stopped me in my tracks. A woman's voice said something like, "he said he shot three of his family members and to come get him."

I immediately told my editor, John Miller, who along with our content manager for our Web site, former reporter Eugene Tong, was still in the newsroom, along with a host of copy editors and designers.

John cautioned me that it could just be some tightly wound type trying to get a little attention, which has certainly happened before. A second riff came over the scanner about the incident on "Welby Way." I called the watch commander at West Valley Station and he told me couldn't comment at all, which is pretty rare. Normally, they give us something.

So, I decided that I would stop by Welby Way on my way home and see what I could find.

When I got there, before 10 p.m., I was the only reporter there. The air was crisp.

The police tape was already up, but I ran into LAPD Sgt. Jim Setzer, a watch commander at the West Valley station, who I spoke with earlier about a Pierce College student who was kidnapped by twins and forced to drive to a local bank and withdraw money.

Standing on the corner of Welby Way and Oakdale Avenue, Setzer shook my hand and asked me to move up a few feet, so "I wouldn't be in the line of fire."

It didn't feel dangerous then - little did I know what horror had already occurred there, with more still to come.

Later, Setzer confirmed that they had received a call from a man claiming he killed family members and who then said: "Come get me."

He told me that apparently the suspect had called 911 three times and officers tried to call him at least three times in the early stages of the investigation.

I called in what I had, along with Setzer's quote to Eugene Tong, who put the story online.

In the meantime, a video stringer showed up, and later still, CBS 2 news.

Still, nothing, it seemed, was happening. John Miller and I had agreed that I should hang out until 11, unless something big unfolded. Not much you can get in the paper past 11 p.m. anyway.

Listening to the radio this morning, my auditory senses were once again jolted: "Five people dead in Winnetka, including one police officer."

Shocking, completely and utterly, shocking.

My thoughts and prayers to the families of slain LAPD Officer Randal Simmons and injured Officer James Veenstra, as well as the surviving members of the the family killed by the gunman.