On March 3 at about 3:52 am, Anaheim police shot and killed a 41-year-old man allegedly wielding a gun. According to the Anaheim Police Department, the man allegedly used a gun to threaten a woman, then possibly fired at least one round, near 600 South Resh Street. The woman left the house before the shooting.
According to the APD, police at the scene used de-escalation techniques to try to get the suspect to surrender, but to no avail. At the end, the suspect came to the door wielding more than one weapon and was shot. “A firearm was recovered from the suspect, and an additional firearm was located inside,” said the APD report.
The standoff with police began about six hours earlier.
The suspect has not been identified. Other offenses may have committed, including domestic violence, assault with a deadly weapon and firing inside an inhabited building. No officers were harmed.
“The suspect came to the front door of his residence, or of the residence in question,” APD Sgt. Shane Carringer told CBS Los Angeles. “An officer-involved shooting did occur in that place. Our officers did employ life-saving efforts. Despite those best efforts that they did use, the suspect was declared deceased on scene.”
An independent investigation of the incident will be undertaken by the office of the Orange County District Attorney.
The incident is different from involving APD in 2018, in which officers killed Elihu Nava Penaloza during a car chase in a residential neighborhood. The DA’s investigation led to a $2.6 million settlement with Penaloza’s family and the firing of one officer. Penaloza was wielding a gun that turned out to be an air pistol before he drove off and tried to escape.
As in that incident, officer bodycams and possible bystander videos will be inspected to determine exactly what happened on March 3.
Despite more publicity in recent years because of the killing of George Floyd in Minneapolis in 2020, officer-involved killings have not risen. In 2021, there were 1,017 across America, according to a Washington Post survey, similar to the amounts of the previous five years.
The number of officer killed in the line of duty has increased dramatically in the last few years, coinciding with the rise of the “Defund the Police” movement. 558 police officers were killed in the line of duty in 2021, a 40% increase from 398 officers killed in 2020. That, in turn, represented a 60% increase from the 157 police officers killed in the line of duty in 2019.
