Las Vegas police shoot, kill man armed with axes
A man armed with two axes was fatally shot by police during a confrontation at an east Las Vegas Valley home, police said Sunday morning.
The landlord for the house said the only person supposed to be living there is 62-year-old Steven Allen Price, who moved in Wednesday. The Clark County coroner’s office hasn’t released the victim’s name.
Kelly McMahill of the Metropolitan Police Department said officers responded just after 11 p.m. Saturday to the 5200 block of Shreve Avenue, near Lake Mead and Nellis boulevards. A security guard had called Las Vegas police to report that “a man was acting erratically and attacking him with a shovel.”
“Our officers arrived on the scene and immediately made contact with the male that the security guard was in a fight with,” said McMahill, captain of Metro’s Office of Internal Oversight and Constitutional Policing.
The officers, McMahill said, repeatedly ordered the man to drop his weapons, but he did not.
“And he refused, at which point he exited his house and he appeared to have a weapon in each one of his hands,” she said. “The officers again made multiple commands for him to drop his weapons and he again refused.”
She said one officer fired a “less lethal” shotgun, which fires beanbags, in the suspect’s direction, and almost simultaneously, the second officer fired a handgun at the suspect.
“It appears at the same time as the officers were firing their weapons, the suspect threw the items he was holding in his hands,” McMahill said. “At this point, we believe those to be a small ax and a larger pickax that are back at the scene.”
Maria Armendariz lives next door with her family, and three rounds hit her home. One round went through the wall and struck the bottom of the stairs inside the house. Another pierced the wall outside her daughter’s upstairs bedroom, she said.
She said she saw the man follow and hit her husband’s truck as he exited the front gate of the neighborhood earlier Saturday. She called police to report the incident, she said. When her husband returned later that night, the couple saw the man confronting the security guard and called police again.
Jennifer Leal lives across the street from the house where the shooting occurred and said she watched the incident unfold from just outside her front door.
Blood stained the front wheel of her family’s red Jeep Grand Cherokee late Sunday morning. At least five bullet holes perforated the driver’s side.
Leal said she saw police in the street talking to the man, who was in the upstairs window of the house across the street.
“And then he said, ‘Don’t shoot me,’ or something like that,” Leal said.
Leal said the man then disappeared from the window and went outside holding something. Police ordered him to drop what he was carrying. She said he may have thrown the object at police, and that’s when officers fired.
On Wednesday, the undersheriff will hold another briefing offering more information on the incident, McMahill said.
Review-Journal staff writer Keith Rogers contributed to this report. Contact Max Michor at mmichor@reviewjournal.com or 702-383-0381. Follow @MaxMichor on Twitter. Contact Blake Apgar at bapgar@reviewjournal.com or 702-387-5298. Follow @blakeapgar on Twitter.
Final update for the night from Cpt. Kelly McMahill of Metro's Office of Internal Oversight and Constitutional Policing #RJNow pic.twitter.com/wvrKskytmX
— Max Michor (@MaxMichor) May 7, 2017
Preliminary details on tonight's OIS from @LVMPD Sgt. Jeff Clark #RJNow pic.twitter.com/WWALc630Eq
— Max Michor (@MaxMichor) May 7, 2017
We're still waiting for an update. Patrol cars are blocking off the entrance to the neighborhood and the surrounding area pic.twitter.com/ONEoVFx65Z
— Max Michor (@MaxMichor) May 7, 2017
