The man reportedly walking away when deputies opened fire..
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Cell phone footage shot from a restaurant across the street shows officers firing approximately a dozen rounds at the suspect as he falls to the ground and they continue shooting even as he attempts to crawl away.
When an officer-involved shooting results in the wounding of a suspect, separate investigations begin at the scene by the Los Angeles County District Attorney’s office, the sheriff’s Homicide Bureau and Internal Affairs Bureau, with the Office of the Inspector General also present, the sheriff’s department statement said.
The deputies approached the suspect and gave him multiple commands to drop the gun, but when he did not comply, “a deputy-involved shooting occurred”, the statement said.
Facebook Nicholas Robertson, 28, died of gunshot wounds suffered during a police shooting at around 11 a.m. on Saturday outside a Lynwood, California gas station. But a mobile phone video appears to show him walking away, KTLA reports. “45 caliber handgun, was recovered at the scene”, Navarro-Suarez said.
It’s unclear if there any people directly in front of Robertson as he walked away.
Local ABC news said an eyewitness who wanted to remain anonymous captured video and said the suspect had been shooting in the air and did not follow police orders.
The department did not say in the statement that the man killed was black, despite stating that the initial reports concerned a black man.
But there were demonstrations at the scene just hours after the shooting, and Robertson’s mother-in-law appeared among the crowd to denounce the man’s death as “injustice”.
“‘If the deputies reasonably believe the suspect with a firearm presents a danger by walking toward a gas station with vehicles and bystanders, they would be justified in using deadly force”, said Stoughton.
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“In this modern age of cellphone video and instant analysis on the internet, I would ask that we keep in mind that a thorough and comprehensive investigation is detailed and time-intensive”, Sheriff Jim McDonnell told the paper in a statement.
