Phoenix police release footage of officer shooting fleeing suspect
By: The Phoenix Police Department released edited bodycam footage Friday of a Nov. 6 incident in which an officer shot at a suspect fleeing in an apartment complex.
Since 2019, the department has produced critical response briefing videos with summaries of police shootings that include some bodycam footage, 911 calls and a narration of the events that led to the shooting.
The briefing video begins with a 911 caller reporting that his friend had been shot in the head by five masked men who fled in a white vehicle around 4:30 p.m. A Phoenix Police Department media advisory on the incident stated police were responding to an armed robbery call.
"As a two-person patrol team arrived at the scene, witnesses pointed at a white vehicle driving by and told the officers the suspects were in that car," Sgt. Phil Krynsky, a spokesperson for Phoenix police, said in the briefing video.
The pair of officers followed the white car near 31st Avenue and Campbell Road to pull it over. The car did not stop, according to officers, prompting a police chase that led to at an apartment complex in the area of 21st and Turney avenues.
The fleeing car stopped and back-seat passengers exited the vehicle before it accelerated and crashed into a parked car. The driver and front-seat passenger fled on foot before officers pursued them through the apartment complex, police said.
Bodycam footage showed the officers' pursuit in their patrol vehicle and on foot through what appears to be an apartment complex parking lot. One officer dropped his firearm upon exiting the patrol car, but picked it up before chasing down the suspects in a sidewalk area. Apartment surveillance footage shows the fleeing suspects and what appears to be a firearm in one of their hands. While near the sidewalk, the bodycam captured the officer firing his gun at a suspect climbing a wall in the distance. A firearm was located on the other side of that wall.
Some of the fleeing suspects were later found nearby, according to police. The two seen fleeing on security camera footage were caught without injuries. The back-seat passengers, however, were not located.
The initial victim for whom 911 was called was treated at a hospital with non-life-threatening injuries, police said. The shooting officer has been with the department for three years and is assigned to the Cactus Park Precinct, according to police. The department has not released the officer’s name. No officers were injured.
The two suspects who were arrested are minors and were booked into Juvenile Corrections Court.
The incident is part of an administrative and criminal investigation, police said. The fleeing suspects are also under criminal investigation, according to police. The Maricopa County Attorney's Office will review the criminal investigations, police said.