Authorities this week released video footage of a San Diego police shooting that killed a vandalism suspect armed with a makeshift flamethrower during a treacherous confrontation in North Park that also left three patrol officers and a service dog injured.
The incident began shortly before 9 a.m. Sept. 16, when several 911 callers reported that a man was threatening people and using some sort of cylindrical object to break windows on vehicles parked along El Cajon Boulevard, near Oregon Street, according to the San Diego Police Department.
Officers located the suspect, later identified as 33-year-old Saul Sandoval Chavez, a short time later on Polk Avenue and tried to contact him, but he ran off, police said.
Chavez fled on Kansas Street and east on Lincoln Avenue as an officer gave chase, his uniform-worn camera activated.
Reaching 30th Street, the suspect stopped, turned around and used a torch lighter to ignite a spray of flammable liquid from an aerosol can in the direction of the officer. Chavez then continued fleeing, shouting belligerently at the pursuing officer before entering a sex shop on 30th Street.
Once inside the business, the suspect again ignited a stream of aerosol spray, directing it toward officers standing in the front doorway, their guns drawn. A surveillance camera in the store recorded video and audio of the violence.
During a brief ensuing standoff, Chavez ignored repeated orders to disarm himself and surrender. As the stalemate got underway, officers directed the sole employee of the shop to exit to safety through the front door as the suspect was holed up in a rear area of the building.
After about five minutes, the suspect — who had been bellowing incoherently, at times sounding like he was weeping — lit his torch again. This time, he directed the flame onto a wall at the back of the shop, prompting an officer to shoot him with a beanbag-firing shotgun. When that impact failed to subdue Chavez, police unleashed a service dog.
Chavez responded by again igniting the aerosol can he was wielding and spraying the flame at the canine. Police then fired more beanbag rounds at the suspect and advanced into the shop, at which point Chavez directed the stream of fire at them. One of the officers, Kyle Lehr, a 10-year member of the department, responded by opening fire with his service pistol, discharging five rounds.
The gunfire caused the aerosol can to explode in a fireball, and Chavez fell to the floor, covered in flame and mortally wounded. Paramedics took him to a hospital, where he was pronounced dead.
Three of the involved officers were treated at a hospital for burn injuries to their hands and released later in the day, police said. Ryder, the service dog, was taken to an emergency veterinary center for treatment of burns to his face and upper body and has since returned to duty.