Bodycam shows DC police shooting an armed man who ran away from a crime suppression unit
By: D.C. police on Monday released body-camera video from an officer who shot and seriously injured a man running from members of a crime suppression unit earlier this month in Northeast Washington.
The video appears to show part of a nighttime foot chase on a sidewalk, with an officer shouting numerous commands to “let me see your hands.”
At one point in the video, which lasts about a minute, the officer warns, “I’m going to shoot you.”
Shots are heard during the chase, and the video ends with someone on the ground, seemingly trying to get up. The video appears to depict only part of the events that have been described by police in papers filed in court.
On the same night as the video was released, authorities identified the officer involved as D.C. police investigator Bryan Madera.
The man who was shot was named in court papers as Deion Hinnant, 31. He was hospitalized, and prosecutors with the U.S. attorney’s office have charged him with unlawful possession of a firearm by a person with a prior conviction. He was ordered detained and has a hearing on Tuesday.
The shooting occurred about 8:50 p.m. in the Langdon neighborhood, just north of New York Avenue. Authorities said officers with the violent crimes suppression unit in an unmarked vehicle saw a man later identified as Hinnant arguing with a person at Bladensburg Road and V Street NE.
An arrest affidavit filed in D.C. Superior Court says the officers saw Hinnant reach into a satchel he was wearing, “making officers believe that he was in possession of a firearm.” The driver made a U-turn and officers saw that Hinnant “was in fact in possession of a firearm,” and that he began to chase the other person, according to the affidavit.
Three D.C. officers got out of the unmarked vehicle and chased Hinnant, “commanding him to show his hands.” Another officer in a marked police car, with lights and sirens activated, assisted in the pursuit.
The affidavit says that at one point Hinnant fell to the ground face down, his back toward the pursuing officers. The affidavit says he then got up “and turns his body 90 degrees to the right, in the direction of [an officer].” The court document says Hinnant bent down toward the ground with his right hand, “appearing to retrieve an object.”
At that point, a D.C. police officer fired multiple shots at Hinnant, according to the affidavit. Hinnant stood up, the affidavit says, and “a dark-colored object can be observed in his right hand.”
The affidavit says he began to run into the drive-through lane at a bank on Bladensburg Road, “where he makes a tossing motion with his right hand upward, the same hand used to bend down and pick up” the object a moment earlier.
Police said Hinnant collapsed in the drive-through lane, was detained and then taken to a hospital. Police said they recovered a loaded black Hi-Point 9mm handgun from the scene. Police also said they found suspected drugs, a digital scale and $124 in cash on Hinnant.
Police have not said how many times or where on the body Hinnant was struck. The affidavit says ShotSpotter, a device used to detect the sounds of gunshots, alerted police to eight shots at the time and location of the shooting.