AURORA | Aurora police on Thursday released a graphic, police-produced video review of a May 4 fatal shooting by officers of a man suspected of shooting another person, and then returning to the scene in a fast and chaotic episode.
Introducing the video, interim Police Chief Heather Morris reads from a script, explaining that this is the beginning of a new process for providing the public information about officer-involved shootings.
She said the video, and some analysis of the shooting is an effort to inform the public even as the incidents are under investigation. Police said the video was redacted in parts to shield the identity of witnesses, as well as to blur out close-up view of injuries, but the video was not cut or changed.
“The goal is to increase our agency’s transparency and accountability,” police said in a statement. “These videos are intended to provide our community with a better understanding of what occurred based on the information we have at the time of their release.”
The film provides viewers with two police body-cam videos showing officers rolling up on a northwest Aurora neighborhood at about 7:45 p.m. May 4.
The film begins with a cut from a 911 tape. The shooting suspect can be heard yelling out as he is shot in the leg, telling dispatchers breathlessly that he was hiding from the shooter.
The video begins with an officer arriving on the scene, and he is immediately confronted by a man who was shot in the leg. The man said the shooting suspect, later identified as Jose Rodriguez-Balderrama, 28, had fled in a red Mustang.
Multiple police rushed to the complex of row-style apartments on the 1400 block of Clinton Street.
En route, police saw a red Mustang in the area and engaged in a brief chase, then losing sight of the car, police reported earlier in May.
While officers were talking with the shooting victim, several neighbors began running and yelling that the suspect had returned to the scene.
Two officers round the corner of a long row of front doors, and the video shows what appears to be a man at a front door of one of the homes farthest from the officers.
Police yell, telling the suspect to show his hands.
It’s unclear in the video what Rodriguez-Balderrama does, but he appears to turn to run from the officers, and several gunshots can be heard, and the suspect drops to the ground.
Rodriguez-Balderrama can be heard groaning as the two officers run to him and begin medical treatment.
In the video, police offer viewers a photo of the gun, modified with a large magazine and able to fire automatically, like a machine gun, police said.
Morris speaks to the camera stoically, saying that APD wants to be forthcoming about the shooting, and that same time, lauding the work, generally that police do under stressful, chaotic conditions.
“I recognize that interactions with officers have lasting impacts on community members,” Morris says in the video, and also in a statement released at the same time. “I also recognize being a police officer is a tough job. Officers must make split-second decisions, in chaotic and dynamic situations often with limited information. We are committed to being a learning organization, focused on training and providing officers with wellness resources to ensure they are equipped to make the best possible decisions even while under duress. I support the men and women of the Aurora Police Department who are willing to risk so much to keep our community safe. I also hold them to very high standards because it’s what the community expects and deserves.”
Many thanks to the officers involved and to the interim Chief. The two videos make crystal clear the challenges officers face in making split-second decisions when they encounter a suicidal gunman.
Regardless if he may have been running away, he was armed and had already shot one person. Putting him down was the surest way to prevent him from shooting someone else. Excellent work.
Totally agree.
Thank for protecting the community. This individual clearly was motivated to come back and create more havoc and bloodshed.