A man was shot and killed by an Anchorage police officer Sunday evening after he ran at the officer with a knife, police said.
It was the fifth fatal shooting by an Anchorage police officer this year.
Officers were called to an address in the 500 block of North Park Street in the Mountain View neighborhood by someone who said there was an emergency and someone was hurt, police said in a summary.
The man who was shot and killed Sunday was also the person who made that report in “multiple calls” to 911 dispatchers, police spokeswoman Renee Oistad said in an email Monday.
“Officers began to recognize, prior to their arrival, that this may be a mental health crisis call and made the decision to contact Mobile Intervention Team (MIT),” Oistad wrote in an email. “They were waiting to make initial contact until proper resources were deployed.”
The team pairs police officers with mental health clinicians to respond to calls that may involve mental health issues.
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Oistad did not answer additional questions about why authorities believed a mental health crisis was involved or if there was actually a separate emergency situation. Police did not find any injured people at the scene, she said.
An officer arrived at the location and parked on Hoyt Street to wait for backup, she said. While other officers and the mobile team were en route, a man holding a roughly 12-inch long knife with a black handle began to approach the officer, Oistad said.
At that point, the officer got out of his vehicle, gave commands to the man and began backing away from him, Police Chief Sean Case said during a late-night news conference.
“As the officer was backing away from the subject, the male began to run at the officer,” Case said. “The officer discharged his weapon striking the suspect in the upper body at least one time.”
The man was declared dead at a hospital, police said.
At the time of the shooting, “officers did not know that the subject was the same individual as the person making the 911 calls, but eventually that was discovered,” Oistad said.
Case said the shooting happened “in a very short timeframe.”
Oistad did not answer additional questions about the timeline, if other people were in the area when the shooting occurred, what brought the man with the knife to the area, or if the officer attempted to give commands to the man from his vehicle before exiting.
The officer wasn’t immediately identified. The shooting was captured on the officer’s body-worn camera and by a patrol vehicle dash camera, police said.
Case said during the news conference that the call highlighted the challenging situations police encounter daily.
“I can’t highlight enough how important it is that people respond to commands that officers give so these types of tragedies don’t occur.”
Anchorage police have now shot eight people so far this year, wounding three and killing five. A 16-year-old girl holding a knife was shot and killed last month at the apartment she shared with her family.
Earlier coverage: Since 2000, Anchorage police have killed 34 people. Here’s what we know about the fatal encounters, and why the department is doing its own analysis.