VIDEO: MAN KILLED BY POLICE WENT FOR GUN
Suspect shown reaching for a weapon on ground, S.D. officer shoots him
Newly released body-worn camera footage shows the moment when a police officer fatally shot a man after he bent over to pick up a handgun during an arrest in College Area last week.
San Diego police said Officer Gregory Simon shot Xavier Benjamin Lacosta, 31, multiple times on the night of Aug. 15 outside of Lacosta’s apartment on El Cajon Boulevard, near College Avenue.
Lacosta was one of two men involved in what was described as a road-rage shooting on Aug. 2 in Clairemont, according to police. Later the same day, an officer shot and killed the other suspect in an early morning standoff on Mesa College’s campus. A police dog was fatally shot in that incident as well.
Two weeks after the Mesa College shooting, police arrived at Lacosta’s apartment around 7 p.m. to serve a warrant for his arrest.
In the edited video, released Tuesday, Police Department officials describe the incident from the officers’ point of view, and provide images from scene. The video also contains footage from Simon’s body-worn camera.
The footage shows the officer standing a few feet away from the doorway of Lacosta’s apartment on the third f loor of the complex. Simon has his rifle trained on the closed door and is yelling for Lacosta to exit the apartment.
“Xavier, come to the door with nothing in your hands!” Simon yells in the video. “San Diego police search warrant.”
After Simon identifies himself multiple times and calls out for Lacosta to come out of the apartment, the door opens.
A man, later identified as Lacosta, is armed with a handgun as he steps into the door frame, the video shows.
“Drop the gun, or I will shoot you!” Simon yells. The two are standing only a few feet from each other.
Lacosta puts the gun on the