Officers fatally shoot man armed with saw in Fontana Home Depot, police say
Police fatally shot a man who was armed with a saw inside a Home Depot in Fontana on Monday night, authorities said.
Officers were dispatched to the intersection of Sierra and Santa Ana avenues shortly after 6 p.m. after a motorist reported that a man attempted to jump in front of her car. The motorist told the 911 operator that it appeared the man was “trying to get run over,” said Sgt. Nathan Weiske, a spokesperson for the Fontana Police Department.
Body-camera footage showed Samuel Soto dropped a knife after he was first shot by police, and that other officers shot him again minutes later, while he was unarmed.
When officers got to the intersection they couldn’t immediately find the man. They discovered he was inside a nearby Home Depot store in the 16700 block of Santa Ana and went in to try to talk to him. But when they approached him, he grabbed a package containing a jab saw off a shelf and opened it, Weiske said. Authorities have not publicly released the man’s identity.
“It’s a sharp-edged weapon capable of causing great bodily injury or death to the civilians who were inside the store at the time and the officers,” he said.
Weiske said officers tried to get the man to drop the saw but he refused. Officers used a Taser on him, but the man held on to the weapon. Shortly before 6:20 p.m., at least one officer opened fire, Weiske said.
The man was shot as he attempted to leave the South L.A. store after an altercation that left another person hospitalized, said the LAPD.
Officers rendered medical aid, but the man was pronounced dead at the scene. It is not clear what happened immediately prior to the shooting.
A manager at the Home Depot store declined to comment on the situation when reached by phone Tuesday.
The San Bernardino County Sheriff’s Department is investigating the shooting and the Fontana Police Department has launched an internal investigation into the use of force, which is normal procedure authorities said.
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