Raleigh police video shows split-second encounter as officer shoots running man
A 26-year-old man shot by a Raleigh police officer Tuesday evening appears to be holding a gun in his right hand as he rounds a corner and comes face-to-face with the officer, according to video from the officer’s body camera released late Wednesday.
It’s not clear if the officer or the man said anything to each other, because the video released by the Raleigh Police Department doesn’t contain audio of their brief and sudden encounter.
The audio resumes after the man is lying on the ground with a single gunshot wound to the abdomen.
Police say the video shows the moment the officer, whose name has not been released, shot Javier Torres behind a house on Duckling Way, off New Bern Avenue.
Police also released video taken from other officers’ body cameras that showed the beginning of a foot chase that began near the Sheetz convenience store off North Rogers Lane.
Torres was taken to WakeMed. On Wednesday, police charged him with “going armed to the terror of the public,” resisting arrest and altering or removing the serial number from a gun.
Caller reports man ‘flashing’ gun
Police said they responded to a call about a man with a gun on North Rogers Lane about 6:40 p.m.
The caller said the man was “flashing” a gun with several other men and had walked to the nearby Sheetz near New Bern Avenue, according to a recording of the 911 call released Wednesday morning by police.
“He’s been walking between Sheetz and Sopranos Grill, back and forth, for about 15 minutes,” said the caller, who was not identified. “So I’m pretty sure they’re looking for somebody.”
Police Chief Cassandra Deck-Brown said at a press conference early Wednesday that the man ran when officers arrived. Police chased after him and told him several times to drop his gun, Deck-Brown said.
The body camera of one of the police officers shows a man holding a pizza box in his left hand and walking beside a building as the officer arrives. The video released by police slows down to show what police say is a gun in the waist band of the man’s pants.
The man, who police say was Torres, ran, and another officer followed, shouting as he gave chase, “Drop the gun. Drop the gun. Drop it right now. Drop the gun.”
By this time, Torres is no longer holding the pizza box as he heads up Rogers Farm Drive toward a wood line. The officer can be heard telling a dispatcher that the man is heading toward “Duckling.”
The video switches to another officer running toward the rear of a house on Duckling Way. As the officer rounds the corner of the house, with his gun raised with both hands, Torres emerges, running, from the trees with what looks like a gun in his right hand. Before he takes a second step, he falls to the ground.
When the audio resumes, Torres can be heard saying, “I’m unarmed. I’m unarmed,” then screaming in pain.
As other officers begin offering first aid, the officer who fired the shot points to the gun Torres was seen carrying, lying on the ground.
The officers applied pressure to Torres’ wound and tried to keep him talking for seven minutes until EMS arrived, according to the video.
Police successfully asked a judge to allow release of the video amid rumors about the shooting. Early accounts spread on Twitter and other social media said police had shot a teenager in the back as he ran from them carrying a pizza.
Based in part on those accounts, protesters gathered outside the homes of Deck-Brown and Mayor Mary-Ann Baldwin on Tuesday night and marched through downtown, decrying police violence, The News & Observer reported. Outside the Executive Mansion on North Blount Street, protesters pulled down and burned the U.S. and state flags, before heading to Moore Square, where the gathering broke up about 3 a.m.
During the press conference, Deck-Brown blamed “reckless and false information that has been spread on social media” for inciting the protests, and said the body camera video would show the rumors about the shooting were not true, The N&O reported.
The Police Department will issue a “five-day report” within five working days of the shooting, providing a fuller, initial account of the incident.
This story was originally published March 11, 2020 at 6:59 PM.