(WBBM NEWSRADIO) — On Monday Aurora police released parts of a 911 call and body camera footage of a police shooting of a 21-year-old man who, armed with knives, charged police officers on Feb. 5.
At the start of the video, Aurora Police Chief Keith Cross said the materials were released in the interest of transparency. He added that Kane County officials are still running an independent investigation of the shooting. Cross said the video contains graphic content. That statement is then repeated in Spanish.
According to the released materials, the events leading up to the shooting began with a family altercation on the morning of Feb. 5 at a residence on the 900 block of Colorado Avenue.
“I’ve got a young grandson here … him and his girlfriend are fighting over a baby,” the caller tells the dispatcher in the recording. “The dad is trying to stop them. It’s getting violent … and before the violence happens I need somebody to remove them.”
While the caller is on the phone with the dispatcher, lots of shouting can be heard in the background of the recording. Shortly after, the caller told the dispatcher that her grandson had a knife. The dispatcher asked if he was using it against anyone.
“Hopefully not, no,” she said.
Over the next few minutes on the recording, the dispatcher can be heard instructing the caller to get themselves and other residents away from the armed man.
Police body camera footage showed police arriving at the home at about 10:40 a.m. As officers approached the door, the suspect appeared behind a closed, glass door. The footage showed him holding a knife in his left hand.
“Put the knife down,” officers can be heard telling him. “We’re here to help you, man.”
As the officers ask for his name, the man briefly disappears inside the home and returns with one knife in each hand.
While officers and the armed man were at the front door, the dispatcher was instructing the residents to evacuate through the garage.
“Put the knife down, just put the knives down,” officers are again shown telling the man. “You’re not in trouble.”
Officers are shown repeatedly reminding the man that he has a child inside the home. Footage then shows the man closing the front door and disappearing inside.
As officers walk away from the front door, other officers can be seen in the released video. A caption reads that these officers were armed with “less lethal” weapons, including a gun loaded with what police described as “pepper ball projectiles.” Officers were set up on the property’s driveway.
Right around the 14-minute mark of the video, the armed man is shown entering the garage and yelling at officers. Several officers tell him to drop the knives. As he turns around, an officer shoots him with the pepper balls.
The armed man then turns toward the officers and charges toward the officers in the driveway. Body camera footage shows an officer pulling out his pistol and shooting the man. Seven shots can be heard before the man falls to the ground.
According to timestamps on the police body camera footage, the shooting took place less than five minutes after Aurora officers approached the residence.
Immediately after the shooting, officers are shown approaching the man and placing him in handcuffs while others are seen near the surviving family members and residents. One person can be heard asking the officers: “Why would you guys shoot him?”
An officer responds that it was because the man “attacked us with a knife.”
In the following minutes, police are shown turning the man onto his back as they administered first aid to his chest, including making a tourniquet.
Family can be heard telling the man that “they’re here” and that medics are on the way.
According to Aurora police, fire department paramedics arrived nearly three minutes after they were requested to the scene. The man was taken to Amita Health Mercy Hospital, where he underwent surgery and survived.
The full video can be found on the Aurora Police Department’s Facebook page.
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