A San Francisco police officer shot and killed a man Sunday night as he ran away from a tent encampment in the Tenderloin neighborhood.
Footage from a neighbor’s security camera, shared with The Standard, recorded an officer yelling “stop” before firing shots at the unidentified man as he ran down Willow Street toward Van Ness Avenue just before midnight. Four gunshots are heard and three muzzle flashes from the officer’s gun are seen in the video.
As the man lay on the ground, the officer can be heard yelling “drop it” and “let me see your hands.” The man died of his injuries in a hospital.
The San Francisco Police Department said the man was armed and officers were responding to a report of a nearby robbery before the shooting. The department did not answer additional questions after being shown the footage. However, a source with knowledge of the incident said the suspect pointed a firearm at an officer.
The video shows a police car approaching a crowd of people next to a row of tents in a Willow Street alley. As an officer opens the driver’s side door, closest to the tents, a man breaks from the crowd and sprints toward Van Ness Avenue, the video reveals. As he runs away, he briefly turns back toward the officer. The officer opens fire on the man moments after another car turns onto Willow.
The man is on the ground for roughly two and a half minutes before a group of police officers approaches him. Officers yell at another person who walks up to the wounded man sprawled on the street.
On Wednesday morning, the city’s Office of the Chief Medical Examiner identified the man as Alexander Antonio Lopez, 28.
Based on the video published by The Standard, the San Francisco Police Officers Association interpretation is that the officer acted in self-defense, although it is unclear exactly what transpired in the alley.
“As he’s running away, you can see the subject turn back towards the officer and we see the muzzle flash and sound of a firearm discharge,” the officers union tweeted. “You can see the officer pursue the subject, yell stop, and then change his pursuit direction to take cover and return fire in defense of his life and others individuals out on the street.”
This is the first fatal shooting by San Francisco police officers this year. It will be investigated by the district attorney and the police department’s Internal Affairs unit and the Department of Police Accountability.
Drew Youngwerth, who has lived nearby for three years, told The Standard that this particular block is a hot spot for drug use. He heard the gunshots last night and saw the man wounded in the street, he said.
“It’s kind of tragic, the things that you see in that alley,” he said. “I don’t exactly know what city officials can do. … You hear people screaming all the time and then you start seeing the ambulance from people overdosing all the time.”
Department policy directs officers to use deadly force as a last resort, when other reasonable alternatives are exhausted.
“The use of firearms and other deadly force is the most serious decision an officer may ever make. When safe and feasible under the totality of circumstances, officers shall consider other objectively reasonable force options before discharging a firearm or using other deadly force,” department rules state.
Deadly force is justified only when officers fear for their lives or the life of another person, the policy states. The only other time force is acceptable is when officers believe the fleeing suspect has both committed a violent felony involving the use or threatened use of deadly force and believe the suspect will harm someone else if not apprehended.