EAST HARLEM, Manhattan (PIX11) — A man is in the hospital in critical condition after police opened fire on him early Monday morning.
Investigators said that the man approached officers with a knife that was more than a foot long, and that he threatened them after wielding the knife outside of a 24-hour food store from which he’d been removed by staff a half hour earlier.
The whole situation was captured on surveillance video from multiple angles.
The shooting took place at around 1:45 a.m. on Third Avenue in the street near City Fresh Market, between 120th and 121st Streets.
It was from that store that the 53-year-old man was ejected after he had aggressively threatened customers, said staff members.
Surveillance video from across the street showed workers physically removing the man from the store at around 1:15 a.m. He walks away, only to return about half an hour later.
That’s when the surveillance video from across the street shows the man, wearing a bright, light blue shirt, holding the knife in his hands while looking into the market.
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Its cameras also captured the situation, up close.
A surveillance camera positioned just inside the front doors of City Fresh Market captured video of the man banging on the front door and windows of the market with a knife, moments after workers had shut and locked the front doors and windows, according to police.
They also said that the knife was 13 inches long and could cause serious harm.
Angel Muñoz, a nearby resident who said that he sees the man frequently on the street and sometimes at the store, said that the weapon made a potentially troubling situation that much worse.
“He’s got mental disturbance,” Muñoz said. “He’s a loose cannon. You never know what he’s thinking in his mind.”
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Police said what more surveillance video shows: after the store called 911 to report that the man was banging on the front door and windows, police arrived within two minutes.
The man walked toward officers, and as Inspector Andrew Lateef, the NYPD official overseeing the investigation, pointed out, he posed a threat to the first responders.
“The officers gave multiple verbal commands to drop the knife, and attempted to create physical distance between [themselves] and the subject,” Inspector Lateef said. “But the subject quickly advanced toward the officers with the knife extended out,” he continued.
Seconds later, the man was shot by officers, the inspector said, in self-defense and to protect others.
Alishia Louis lives nearby and said that the shooting was necessary.
“I come shopping here a lot,” she said, “and the fact that there’s a man coming in with a big knife to come and attack us, anyone could’ve been hurt. So the fact that the police did their job, I think it was great.”
Police said that the man, whose identity is not yet released, had a variety of past arrests. They also said that charges are pending in this latest case.
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