Police, witness at odds on shooting

SILVER SPRING, Md. — A Maryland man who was shot and killed by police was armed with a rifle and ignored com- mands to show his hands and get on the ground when officers entered his home, police said in a statement Tuesday.

Police on The an Department’s officer’s Montgomery fatal statement shooting County of 21-year-old Duncan Socrates Lemp contradicts an eyewitness account cited by an attorney for Lemp’s family on Friday. The eyewitness said Lemp was asleep in his bedroom when police opened fire from outside his house in Potomac, Md., a suburb of Washington D.C., the family’s attorney, Rene Sandler, said.

Police disputed that account. The department says tactical unit officers who entered Lemp’s home around 4:30 a.m. last Thursday to serve a search warrant announced themselves as police and gave Lemp “multiple orders” to show his hands and comply with commands to get on the ground.

with “Lemp the officer’s refused commands to comply and proceeded towards the interior bedroom door where other officers were located,” the police statement says. “Upon entrance by officers into the Lemp’s bedroom, Lemp was found to be in possession of a rifle and was located directly in front of the interior bedroom entrance door.”

The department’s statement does not specify when Lemp was fatally shot.

Authorities also said they ound a device designed as a “booby trap” affixed to the inside frame of Lemp’s bedroom door, police said. The device was intended to fire a shotgun shell at anyone entering the door, according to police.