AURORA | District attorney investigators said several Arapahoe deputies were justified when they shot and killed an armed man threatening his family in June.
In the 10-page report released Tuesday, Senior Chief Deputy District Attorney Jason Siers found that four sheriff deputies fired their weapons in self-defense June 23 after Andrew Allen Paine fired on officers while trying to escape the scene in his Jeep.
Deputies fired a combine 31 bullets to stop Paine, who fired bullets past officers into his home and through a window, according to the report. No sheriff’s deputies were struck.
Earlier on June 23, Paine and his girlfriend argued about whether they split up. The argument escalated, and then Paine pulled a gun, pointing it at his girlfriend.
“One or both of them were going to die”, Paine told his girlfriend, a witness said.
More than an hour later, a friend of Paine’s girlfriend called 911. The friend told dispatchers the two were fighting in Paine’s Centennial home on South Olive Street. Paine’s girlfriend had called her friend, but at one point Paine could be heard screaming and disconnected the call.
During the 911 call, the friend said she received a text from Paine: “After the cops murder me they’ll find that I have a broken hand and that any perceived threat was falsified (sic).”
The investigation never addressed why Paine referred to an injured hand.
Paine’s girlfriend fled the house with two children before two sheriff’s deputies arrived for a welfare check, but the deputies were unaware of that, according to the investigation.
As as deputies arrived, they saw Paine in the garage holding a gun, investigators said.
More officers arrived at the house. Paine, holed up in the garage, and screamed profanities. He spoke with his girlfriend on the phone, who tried to calm Paine down. She was near the house with a deputy listening in, according to the report.
Paine said he had guns and that he “was ready.”
Deputies then heard gunshots inside the garage, investigators said. Two officers broke down the front door and entered the house. They discovered a bullet hole in the interior door to the garage. The deputies, who at the time did not know the girlfriend and her children had left the house, said they thought Paine had shot himself or a family member.
Deputies heard a car start in the garage, and then the garage door opened. Police body cam video showed Paine back a silver Jeep down his driveway. Multiple officers told investigators they saw Paine pointing a handgun out the driver’s side window, toward deputies.
Deputies fired a total of 31 shots, but Paine continued backing his Jeep out of the driveway. He then briefly drove toward a deputy standing in the street, before slumping over in the car seat, investigators said.
One deputy pulled Paine from the car, and it rolled down the street and into a garage door.
An autopsy revealed Paine was shot twice in the head and once in the chest.
He was rushed to a nearby hospital, where he was pronounced dead.
Deputies found a .40 caliber semi-automatic handgun on the driver’s side floorboard of the Jeep, with one round in the chamber and 11 more in a magazine, investigators said. Deputies found another handgun in the Jeep, and two .40 caliber bullet casings inside the car.
During the investigation after the shooting, witnesses said Paine was abused as a child and had a history of alcoholism, bipolar disorder, and post-traumatic stress disorder.