NYPD shoots unarmed man; 911 callers said he had a gun
A woman in Brooklyn called 911 to report a man with a gun minutes before police fatally shot a black man wielding a pipe that was mistaken for a firearm, according to partial 911 transcripts released Thursday by the NYPD.
The state Attorney General’s Office announced it would investigate the death of Shaheed Vassell, 34, who was killed Wednesday.
“There is a guy in a brown jacket walking around pointing, I don’t know, what is he pointing in people’s faces? They say it’s a gun, it’s silver,” one caller says. Another person says a “crazy” person is pointing “something that looks like a gun, and he’s popping it as if, like, he’s pulling the trigger,” another caller says.
A third caller says she is calling from her laundromat and sounds more certain that a gun is involved. Queried by a dispatcher, the woman says, “Yeah, he have (a) gun ... (in) his hand.”
NYPD Chief of Department Terence Monahan said responding officers encountered Vassell on the street.
“The suspect then took a two-handed shooting stance and pointed an object at the approaching officers, two of whom were in uniform,” Monahan said.
Monahan said four officers fired 10 shots at Vassell, who was pronounced dead at a hospital shortly after the shooting. The object Vassell pointed turned out to be a short pipe with a knob on the end, Monahan said.
Monahan staunchly defended the officers, releasing surveillance video from the area that shows Vassell pointing the object at people.
“This was a call of a man pointing what 911 callers ... felt was a gun,” Monahan said. “When we encounter him, he turns with what appears to be a gun at the officers. We have to stay straight on the facts with this incident.”
Vassell’s parents and some community members expressed outrage.
Eric Vassell said his son was bipolar but not on medication. His son was not a threat to the officers, he said.
“They never said, ‘Mister, we are the police; hold your hands up,’ ” Eric Vassell told WABC-TV. “Law enforcement should not just come out and shoot and ask questions after.”
Lorna Vassell said her son would have dropped the pipe if ordered by the police.
The incident is the latest in a string of police-involved shootings of oftenunarmed black men around the nation in recent years.