SPOKANE, Wash. – New video taken inside the north Spokane Walmart by a shopper shows the chaotic, violent moments leading up to a Spokane Police officer shooting and killing a suspected shoplifter Sunday morning.
The sound of tasers going off and the screams of one man, along with commands from police officers, rang loud and clear inside the Walmart on North Colton Street before 11 a.m. Sunday.
Many shoppers seemed to go about their business as normal, while others were more so caught closer to the action.
“I think the reason why there wasn’t hysteria and panic is because everybody knew something was going on anyways,” Witness Leslie Bytnar said.
The Spokane Police Department (SPD) says an SPD officer was working a shoplifting prevention special emphasis when they became aware of a man trying to steal from the store. Upon this realization, the officer called in for backup.
When the two officers approached the suspect, a physical and violent confrontation ensued, before one of the officers shot and killed the man as he attempted to run away.
A nearly 30 second video sent to NonStop Local KHQ by a viewer, who chose to remain anonymous only shows a portion of the confrontation between the officers and the suspected shoplifter. The video shows two officers tasing the suspect as he resisted arrest.
Leslie Bytnar saw it all go down.
“He was not listening and being kind of combative, and so I saw him get tased,” she said. “[He] started to fall to the ground, and they put him down and they were trying to detain him, and he got up somehow, I don’t know how but he did, and he started to come towards me – not me specifically but my direction.”
The suspect did manage to get away, at least for a short amount of time.
“He actually started running and the police officer tased him again, and he ran, while being tased, towards the other entrance,” Bytnar said.
Other witnesses, just behind the video camera, could be heard making remarks as the man tried to flee the officers. One man said the suspect “had a right to carry a firearm,” while another woman responded by saying, “not if he’s stealing or something, and they were trying to disarm him.”
According to SPD, a gun and ammo were found near the scene, believed to belong to the suspect. Officers say this escalated the situation; as the man continued to resist arrest, an SPD officer fired his weapon, shooting and killing the suspected shoplifter.
At some point in the fight, two officers sustained minor injuries – one of them was evaluated further at a hospital – but both will be okay.
Per standard protocol, according to SPD, the officer who fired his weapon was placed on incident review leave. This officer has not been identified and will not be for several days.
As of Monday evening, the man killed has also not been identified – this information will be released by the Spokane County Medical Examiner’s Office.The Spokane Independent Investigation Response Team, SIIR Team, is taking lead on this investigation, with the Spokane County Sheriff’s Office as the managing agency. SPD is not involved in this investigation.
