Las Vegas police fatally shoot suspect in south valley

A man suspected of firing on a man outside a south valley retail store Monday afternoon was fatally shot shortly after by Las Vegas police.

The Metropolitan Police Department, which did not identify the dead man, said the suspect ignored officers' commands during the encounter and instead grabbed a handgun from his waistband.

Three officers shot at the man shortly after 3 p.m., Deputy Chief Kathleen O'Connor said.

O'Connor said the officers who responded to the first shooting outside the Ross Dress for Less store, 2420 E. Desert Inn Road, near Eastern Avenue, found an injured man who had been hit in his right hand in the parking lot.

Another department official said the injured man may have been homeless.

He gave officers a description of his assailant and said the gunman fled to an alley behind the store, O'Connor said.

Officers are well trained in how to respond when confronting an armed suspect, she said.

"Their sense of awareness will be heightened and much more vigilant," she said.

Investigators were trying to piece together the events that preceded the shooting, noting that officers did not give statements to department investigators, O'Connor said.

She also said she didn't know why the man who was shot by police may have fired at the man in the parking lot.

No officers were injured in the shooting. The man shot in the hand was treated at Sunrise Hospital and Medical Center. His name was not released.

Shoppers inside Ross were not endangered during the shooting, O'Connor said.

The officers' identities will be released 48 hours after the shooting, per department policy. They have been placed on paid administrative leave.

Police didn't specify where officers shot the suspect. But later that afternoon, investigators focused their attention on a loading ramp leading to a garage behind the store.

While police tape roped off much of the parking lot in front and behind the store, people still shopped at neighboring stores and waited for transportation at a nearby bus stop.

Maria Ruiz, who lives in the neighborhood behind the shopping center, said in Spanish that there was a heavy police presence near her house Monday afternoon.

She said she saw a police helicopter hovering above and several patrol units driving up and down her street.

She said she was about to walk into her house when she heard three loud gunshots.

"Oh my God, someone is dead," she recalled thinking.

A few minutes later she grabbed a chair, stepped up and peered over her backyard fence at the back of the Ross store and saw four patrol cars.

Monday's shooting marked the seventh time this year Las Vegas police officers fired their weapons on duty.

The last shooting involving an officer occurred in July, when an officer who stopped for coffee at a 7-Eleven shot a man trying to rob the store.

The five earlier shootings in 2012 mark the department's fewest in a six-month period in a decade.

In 2010 and 2011, Las Vegas police had a combined 43 on-duty shootings.

Metropolitan Police Department officers killed a record 12 people in 2011.

Contact reporter Antonio Planas at aplanas@reviewjournal.com or 702-383-4638.