Los Angeles police released more information Wednesday about their shooting of a suspect who brandished what turned out to be a BB gun after he allegedly menaced someone in his Mid-City neighborhood who asked him to turn his music down.
Officers were dispatched at about 6:50 a.m. Tuesday to investigate an assault with a deadly weapon report in the 1800 block of Alsace Avenue, south of Venice Boulevard, with the suspect still present, according to a Los Angeles Police Department statement.
The person who made the report told officers that suspect, later identified as 34-year-old Jamil Basheer, had “pulled a gun on him” after he asked Basheer to turn his music down, police said.
The alleged victim directed officers to Basheer’s residence.
“After requesting additional resources, officers attempted to make contact with Basheer,” according to the LAPD, which went on to report that Basheer then allegedly “produced a handgun, prompting officers to redeploy to the street while issuing verbal commands for him to surrender.”
When Basheer suddenly exited the front door and ran toward officers while armed with a handgun in his left hand and a knife in his right with the gun pointed at officers, at least one of them opened fire, police said.
“Basheer was struck once and fell to the ground, dropping both the handgun and the knife,” police said. “He then stood up and ran back inside his residence.”
Basheer surrendered soon afterward and was taken into custody. Los Angeles Fire Department personnel took him to a hospital, where he was treated for a gunshot wound to his jaw, police said.
Basheer is now in stable condition and will be booked when medically fit, police said.
The gun, which was found to be Glock 19-style BB gun loaded with two .177 caliber rounds and a charged CO2 cartridge, and a six-inch folding knife were recovered as evidence, according to the department.
Force Investigation Division detectives responded to the scene and were investigating the incident.
Janine Cohen, an attorney who lives in a gated townhouse community across the street, told reporters that shortly after 7:30 a.m., “I heard a gunshot, immediately followed by a series of additional shots in rapid succession. Shortly thereafter, I heard police loudspeakers instructing someone to come out with his hands up.”
Not long afterward, she said she saw a man “sitting up on a gurney” before being loaded into a waiting ambulance.
“It is normally a fairly quiet neighborhood aside from the occasional loud party and fireworks activity,” Cohen said. “Shortly after I moved in, there was a drive-by shooting that was gang-related, but there had not been any similar events until today.”