SALT LAKE CITY — Body-worn camera footage has been released by the Salt Lake City Police Department from an officer-involved shooting of a man who attacked an officer, FOX 13 reported.
The Jan. 9 incident began when an officer conducted a traffic stop. Footage shows the officer speaking with the driver and looking at documentation before returning to his vehicle. After he returned to his cruiser, he was approached by a man who told him he was conducting a “citizens audit.”
After the man did not comply with instructions to back away from the officer, the officer can be seen pushing him away.
According to police, the man confronted and challenged the officer before escalating into a physical attack. The video depicts the man advancing toward the police car while pointing and gesturing at the officer, who repeatedly commanded him to stop. At the time of the incident, a community member participating in a ride-along was inside the officer’s vehicle.
Video shows the man throwing an object in a plastic bag at the officer, calling the contents his “credentials.” After throwing the object at the officer, he raises his hands in an apparent martial arts pose.
At this point, the officer backed away from the man, shining a flashlight at him. Body camera video shows the man continuing to point at the officer in a threatening position.
The man continued to approach the officer, asking for his name. As he approached, the officer suddenly backed away, drawing his gun and commanding the man to “drop it,” and “get on the ground.”
“You don’t have authority to tell me to get on the ground,” the man said as he ran backward toward the cruiser and stopped vehicle.
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He climbed into the bed of the stopped driver’s pickup truck, which appeared to be full of building supplies. The man picked up a piece of building material and held it out in front of him as the officer continued to instruct him to get on the ground.
The officer calls for backup, telling officers and dispatchers that the man was in possession of a knife.
“It’s not a knife, you liar,” the man can be heard saying.
After insisting that the officer identify what kind of weapon he was reportedly holding and how many inches long it was, he stood up and jumped out of the truck bed.
“I bet you don’t have ammunition on you,” he said, before pointing at the citizen in the passenger seat of the cruiser and demanding that they get out of the car.
As the man started to approach the citizen, the officer fired multiple shots, repeatedly striking the man.
The man remained conscious, attempting to speak with the officer and not showing his hands, before apparently losing consciousness and falling backwards. The officer continued to point his gun at the man until backup units arrived. When another officer arrived, he told her that the man still had an object in his hand which he believed was a knife.
Police reported that a weapon was recovered at the scene, though details about the weapon have not been disclosed due to the ongoing investigation, according to the report. The suspect was transported to a hospital, where he later died. The officer sustained injuries during the encounter but is expected to recover.
“This was a very quickly unfolding situation and I am incredibly relieved that our officer wasn’t injured more severely,” said Salt Lake City Police Chief Mike Brown. “While the investigation is still ongoing, what I can say is that this certainly was a dangerous situation that resulted an injury to our officer and that posed a serious and imminent threat to his life and potentially the lives of others.”
The investigation into the incident is ongoing, and additional details will be released as they become available.
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