Fifth Officer-Involved Shooting of 2016 Reported Friday Night

The city saw its fifth officer-involved shooting of 2016 – and fourth such incident in four weeks – on Friday night when an officer shot and killed a man Austin Police Chief Art Acevedo says charged full speed at the officer with two knives in his hands.

The incident occurred at the Randalls supermarket on MoPac and William Cannon. The individual, a 29-year-old male, was first seen by witnesses pacing around the supermarket’s parking lot with knives in his hands. Witnesses called 9-1-1 at 10:12pm that night. Officers arrived within minutes, and by 10:20pm had broadcast that shots were fired, and the man was hit. He was pronounced dead at 10:49pm.

Acevedo said that supermarket security cameras and the officer’s dashboard camera captured the totality of the fatal incident. He said that the officer – a four-and-a-half year veteran with APD – issued a series of commands telling the subject to drop the knife, but that the subject resisted and instead charged full speed at the officer. Armed with an AR-15 rifle, the officer shot while the individual was mid-charge.

“When somebody’s running full-speed with two knives at a police officer, there’s a good chance you’re going to get shot,” said Acevedo. “Based on what we’ve seen so far at this scene, this appears to be a phenomenon we call suicide by cop.”

He said that a call to 9-1-1 from the Dollar General Store on West Stassney Lane earlier in the night reported what’s believed to be the same person in the parking lot pacing around with a pair of knives.

The officer has been placed on paid administrative leave while Internal Affairs and the Travis County District Attorney’s Office conduct their separate investigations into the incident.