The 35-year-old man shot by police after allegedly raising a rifle in the direction of officers in Koreatown was identified Monday as Taylor Dean Sanders.
Officers responded around 8:15 p.m. Saturday to reports of a man with a rifle in the 3400 block of West Sixth Street near Kenmore Avenue and Wilshire Boulevard, according to the Los Angeles Police Department.
Sanders had left the location before officers arrived but was discovered around 9:20 p.m. on the south side of Wilshire Boulevard, west of Kenmore Avenue, carrying what appeared to be a black assault rifle, police said.
Officers attempted to contact Sanders, but at some point, he raised the rifle in the direction of police, which resulted in an officer-related shooting, police said.
Officers requested additional assistance as Sanders began running away. According to police, responding officers from the Rampart and Olympic divisions later discovered Sanders walking south on Vermont Avenue from Wilshire Boulevard.
The officers began to follow Sanders from behind the cover of their trailing police vehicles as he was running. Before he reached mid-block between Wilshire Boulevard and Seventh Street, and officers deployed 40mm less-lethal bean bags toward Sanders. However, Sanders raised and pointed his rifle in the pursuing officers’ direction, which resulted in a second officer-involved shooting.
Sanders continued to elude officers south on Vermont Avenue to a multi-unit shopping center and parking lot at the northeast corner of Seventh Street and Vermont Avenue, police said.
“Officers again deployed 40mm less-lethal launchers towards Sanders and as Sanders again pointed his rifle in the direction of officers resulting in a third OIS,” the department said in a statement.
Sanders then barricaded himself in an open-air stairwell of the parking lot and refused to comply with the officer’s commands.
A SWAT team responded and attempted to get the suspect to come out from behind the stairwell, police said.
“SWAT utilized a remote-controlled tracked vehicle to assess the suspect’s condition and attempted to retrieve the suspect’s firearms,” the statement said. “The tracked vehicle’s arms were unable to retrieve the weapons.”
SWAT officers then deployed another type of controlled vehicle that removed the man’s firearms, “which allowed officers to approach the suspect and provide medical treatment,” LAPD said.
Sanders was taken into custody shortly before 3 a.m. and transported to a hospital in stable condition, police said.
No officers or bystanders were injured, and the case remains under investigation.