American Officer shoots a combatant white man during fight at bus station in west Phoenix

By Edward Era Barbacena

A man is in the hospital after police said he attacked an officer, leading to that officer shooting him at a bus station in west Phoenix early Wednesday morning. Phoenix Police Sgt. Melissa Soliz said the unidentified man was acting erratically and disturbing people inside a building at the Tufesa bus depot near 27th Avenue and McDowell Road around 4:45 a.m. The first officer to arrive asked him to come outside to talk. Once outside, Soliz said the suspect started to “violently and physically attack the officer.”

The officer fired his Taser at the man, but he continued to fight. Police say the officer tried to take the man into custody when he turned around and kicked the officer, which caused him to lose control of his stun gun. The man got up and continued to attack the officer, who then shot at the man. He was taken to the hospital in serious condition. The officer wasn’t hurt.

This is the fourth shooting involving Phoenix police officers in the past five days. “We are all very aware of how many officer-involved shootings we’ve had. This is something that’s concerning,” Sgt. Soliz said. “Our officers respond to calls every day, all day that can potentially end up in officer-involved shootings or violence.” She added that it’s also important to note that many incidents end peacefully. Maricopa County Attorney Rachel Mitchell also addressed the increasing number of dangerous confrontations on Wednesday. “It speaks to the level of violence that police officers are facing,” Mitchell said. “They have an incredibly difficult job.”

Since she started as county attorney last year, Mitchell says her office has cleared the backlog of more than 50 police shooting cases. She believes most of the people getting shot by police in Maricopa County are people who legally shouldn’t have guns. “Anecdotally, what we are seeing is that there is a very high correlation between felons who were illegally in possession of firearms and those that later involved in shootouts with police.”