Alvin police: Officer kills man waving gun
A man who fired a shot into a home Sunday was later killed by a police officer after he “repeatedly screamed at the officers to shoot him as he waved a gun around,” according to a news release from the Alvin Police Department.
It was the third officerinvolved shooting in the Houston area over the weekend.
In the latest incident, the unidentified man fled the first shooting scene and wound up being fatally shot in the parking lot of the Alvin Missionary Baptist Church in the 2000 block of West Lang Street.
“We praise God we were not in services and all the people who would have been present an hour later were not,” Pastor Justin Gatlin wrote on Facebook. He added that his wife and daughter were taking a nap “maybe 100 yards from where it happened.”
The series of events began around 4 p.m. when a caller reported a man was suicidal and had fired into a home. The gunman fled on a motorcycle with the firearm, according to police.
Within minutes, police found the motorcycle, and the suspect emerged from a nearby wooded area with his weapon. “Officers gave repeated instructions for the suspect to put the weapon on the ground,” but he screamed for officers to shoot him, police said.
The suspect did finally place the weapon on the ground but suddenly retrieved the gun and brought it back up as the officers moved in on him. One officer fired on the suspect, the release stated. He was given treatment and transported to a local hospital, where he died.
On Saturday, the Harris County Sheriff’s Office said a deputy shot a 26year-old man who pointed an AK-47 at him in north Harris County. And earlier Sunday, Houston police shot an armed teenage robbery suspect who was fleeing on foot through the Northline neighborhood.
The Alvin church canceled scheduled services Sunday evening.
Gatlin posted an update on Facebook about an hour after the incident. He said the shooting happened in the rear church parking lot and that the man who was shot “is not associated with AMBC.”