Visalia police chief backs officer in fatal shooting of man in a wheelchair
Dec. 12--Visalia Police Chief Colleen Mestas on Monday said an officer from her department correctly handled a deadly confrontation with a man in a wheelchair.
The man was shot Saturday afternoon after he got up from the wheelchair he was riding in and lunged at the officer while holding a knife, police said.
The incident happened about 4:30 p.m.
The man died a short time later at a hospital.
The name of the man is being withheld until family members are notified, Visalia police Sgt. Amy Watkins said Monday. Police have not released the name of the officer; he has been placed on administrative leave while the Tulare County Sheriff's Department investigates the shooting.
The Sheriff's Department referred questions about the case to the Visalia Police Department.
Mestas said her department also will do an internal review of the case.
Mestas said the man in the wheelchair was told multiple times to drop the knife and refused to do so.
The officer feared for his life, police said in a statement.
"These officers have to make a decision in a split second," Mestas said. "When presented in a threatening manner with a knife, he made the right decision."
Saturday night, Watkins described what happened:
Police got a call from Sears that a man in a wheelchair was seen shoplifting and he brandished a knife at employees when confronted outside Sears. The department store is in the Sequoia Mall shopping center on South Mooney Boulevard.
The man left Sears and was seen going into Marshalls in a smaller shopping center north of Sears.
The Visalia police officer found the man on the north side of Marshalls leaving through a rear door.
The officer was on a special holiday detail and arrived in a marked car after police dispatched officers to the area.
The man got out of his wheelchair after a "short scuffle" with the officer, Mestas said.
"Just because somebody is in a wheelchair doesn't mean you can automatically assume someone is wheelchair-bound," Mestas said.
Police had dealt with the man before, Mestas said, but she said she didn't know if the officer who opened fire knew the suspect.
Sharon Darst, an assistant for a tax accountant who was working in a nearby office, said she and her boss heard the gunshots.
"We heard the 'pop-pop,' " Darst said. She and her boss went outside to see what was going on and saw the man get arrested and taken away in an ambulance, she said.
"He was conscious when he was taken away," Darst said.
Darst's boss, accountant Bob Fatica, said he saw five officers with guns drawn and the man lying on his back on the ground.
"They kept telling him to roll over," and he was placed in handcuffs with his hands behind his back, Fatica said.
"He was talking and cussing," Fatica said.
The man was pronounced dead at 5:09 p.m. at Kaweah Delta Medical Center, police said. His age was not released.
An officer-involved shooting in Visalia took place last year when a deranged man shot and killed a Mormon bishop at a church. The man fled, and died when shot by police elsewhere in Visalia.
Before that, the last officer-involved shooting in Visalia took place in 2002, police said.
The reporter can be reached at lgriswold@fresnobee.com or (559) 622-2416.
Copyright 2011 - The Fresno Bee, Calif.
