SIU probe one of two shootings in city
Investigate what Hamilton police say was an ‘interaction’ with the victim after responding to ‘threat involving weapon’
Ontario’s police watchdog is investigating after two Hamilton police officers fired bullets at a 19-year-old man in a Mountain residential area Tuesday afternoon.
“He was transported to hospital, where he was pronounced dead,” Monica Hudon, spokesperson for the Special Investigations Unit, said at the scene around 8:30 p.m.
Hudon said police were responding to calls about an armed man on Caledon Avenue just north of Tyrone Drive around 3:30 p.m.
“At this stage in the investigation, I am not prepared to disclose what the weapon was,” she said, also declining to say whether one had been found.
Residents of the townhouse complex near Upper James Street and Mohawk Road East came home from work Tuesday afternoon to find a taped-off crime scene and police cruisers.
The manager of the Victoria Park Community Homes complex told The Spectator the man whom police shot lived there.
“I watched him grow up . ... He’s a good kid,” Yvonne Alexander said, not long after the confrontation unfolded.
In a media release, police said officers had responded to a “threat in progress involving a weapon” at the complex.
“Upon arrival, Hamilton Police interacted with an adult male,” the release added, but didn’t release any more information.
“Once the SIU invokes their mandate, all questions must be directed to them,” police spokesperson Jackie Penman responded via email.
The SIU is a provincial agency that probes incidents involving police in which a civilian is seriously injured or killed.
Alexander said the teen’s parents went with him by ambulance to the hospital.
“It’s very tragic, and children coming off the school bus saw this.”
Alexander — who didn’t see the shooting but said she spoke to a resident who did — is the sister of Anthony Divers, who police shot dead on James Street South in 2016.
Her daughter, Jaclyn Alexander, 33, said she was with her boyfriend on Tuesday afternoon when they pulled up to Caledon Drive to park, but were turned away.
“I’m sort of in shock right now,” she later said. “I just know there’s a boy on the ground. I could see blood everywhere. Not any movement from the boy.”
Jaclyn Alexander also said she saw police “hugging” each other across the street.
Hudon said the 19-year-old was taken to St. Joseph’s Hospital.
She wouldn’t say what exactly prompted two calls to police about an armed man, what he was allegedly doing, or whether the officers used Tasers before firing their guns.
Hudon said the SIU will speak to witnesses and examine evidence. The agency will also request interviews with the two subject officers and four witness officers.
Anyone with information about the shooting is asked to contact the SIU’s lead investigator at 1-800-787-8529.
The agency is also urging anyone who may have any video evidence related to this incident to upload that video through the SIU website.
Residents were still met with police tape and a cruiser on Tuesday evening as rain fell and fog draped the street.
An autopsy is scheduled for Wednesday afternoon in Hamilton.
Yvonne Alexander has been critical of the SIU’s investigation and called for Hamilton police to wear lapel cameras.
Her 36-year-old brother had been walking up James Street South when an officer shot him twice in 2016.
Witnesses said he didn’t have a weapon,.
But the SIU cleared the officer, saying he was responding to a call about a reportedly armed man who’d committed an assault.