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Walter Hock was rolling pizza dough for a late-night snack Friday when the "pop-pop" of gunfire erupted outside his house on West Maple.

Looking out the front door, he saw one police officer sprawled in the street and another pointing his gun into the darkness.

As Hock watched, the officer with the gun dragged the downed officer behind a patrol car for cover.

"You could see the blood," Hock said.

The shooting near midnight sent the police officer to Via Christi Regional Medical Center-St. Francis Campus in serious condition with a wound to his upper leg.

A 23-year-old man has been arrested in connection with the city's most recent homicide, police said Friday.

Capt. Brent Allred said the man is an acquaintance of Ottaway K. Wright Jr., 60, who was found dead Tuesday in his Planeview duplex at 3471 E. Roseberry.

The 21-year-old woman who found Wright told police he appeared to have been stabbed several times. Given the condition of the duplex, Allred said, it was evident that an extended struggle had taken place.

"There was some type of relationship" between the suspect and Wright's wife, Allred said.

The man was already in the Sedgwick County Jail for an outstanding warrant when he was booked on suspicion of first-degree murder Thursday morning, Allred said.

Jurors won't be able to consider whether Cherish McCullough acted in self-defense in the stabbing death of LaShanda Callaway.

The fight that led to Callaway's death was captured graphically on video -- and shown to jurors earlier this week.

Judge Ben Burgess ruled Friday after the defense rested its case in McCullough's murder trial that the jury can't consider a not-guilty verdict based on self-defense because the facts don't warrant it.

McCullough, who was 19 at the time, is charged with first-degree murder in the June 23, 2007, stabbing at a Wichita convenience store.

Video evidence showed Callaway, 27, was in a "fist-fight," Burgess said.

One of Wichita's most prominent Democratic officeholders, Mayor Carl Brewer, will be spicing up a Republican fundraiser.

Brewer is the headliner and celebrity chef for "a special barbecue event" to raise money for the re-election campaign of Republican Sen. Pat Roberts.

Roberts is locked in a spirited race with less-well-funded but scrappy challenger Jim Slattery, a Democrat and former congressman.

Brewer was in Alabama for a conference last week and did not reply to two e-mails seeking comment.

Although the Roberts event is unrelated to city business, Brewer issued a statement through the city's public information office.

Education and energy were high priorities for the five candidates in the 81st House District's Republican primary, but the state's budget concerns were the biggest issue.

The state cannot keep spending more than it brings it, but Kansans' personal budgets are also shrinking, so more taxes are not the answer, they said.

The field includes Patsy Allen, 63, a retired Boeing Aircraft manager; Jeri Anderson, 60, a retired teacher and Mulvane Senior Center director; Arlene Burrow, 54, a family practice lawyer; Rep. Peter DeGraaf, 51, Mulvane, a financial counselor; and Charlene Eye, 62, a retired aircraft worker. The winner will run against Mulvane Democrat Mark Hardison in the November general election.

The competition sprang up after the district's longtime representative, Mulvane Republican Ted Powers, died in May after suffering a stroke. Party leaders from Sedgwick and Sumner counties appointed DeGraaf to serve the rest of Powers' term, which expires in January.

"The Legislature has not done a very good job controlling expenses and keeping taxes down," DeGraaf said.