AURORA | The Arapahoe County Coroner’s office has identified the man shot and killed by local sheriff’s deputies on the border of Centennial and Greenwood Village yesterday as 18-year-old Allen Fanning.
Fanning died of gunshot wounds, according to a press release issued by Casey Bitting, a forensic pathologist with the coroner’s office. His death has been ruled a homicide. He died one week shy of his 19th birthday.
Fanning reportedly led Arapahoe County sheriff’s deputies on a roughly 2.5-mile car chase on East Arapahoe Road yesterday morning.
Deputies originally responded to a report of a domestic violence incident involving two people at about 9 a.m. Thursday near the Big O Tires store along the 6700 block of South Potomac Street in Centennial. Upon responding, deputies determined a third person involved in the incident had menaced another person with a gun and fled the scene in a car.
At least three officers then pursued the suspect in their own cruisers on suspicion of felony menacing before boxing the driver in near the intersection of Arapahoe and South Dayton Street.
Deputies then asked the driver, who was the only person in the car, to exit the vehicle. The driver refused.
Sheriff’s deputies then tried to break a car window to extract the driver. The person behind the wheel then reportedly reached for a gun, prompting deputies to shoot him.
The deputies at the scene tried to render first aid to the man who was shot before he was taken to a local hospital and later pronounced dead.
A loaded gun was later found in the suspect’s car.
One deputy involved in the incident yesterday suffered minor injuries and was treated at a local hospital.
Three deputies have been placed on paid administrative leave for their involvement in the shooting, according to a press release from the sheriff’s office. One of the three deputies has been with the office for three years, while the other two deputies involved in the shooting have worked for the sheriff’s office for more than 10 years.
Arapahoe Road was closed for several hours in both directions following the officer-invovled shooting.
The pursuit down East Arapahoe Road was in line with the sheriff’s office policies, according to tweets. A critical response team, coordinated through the 18th Judicial District Attorney’s Office, will investigate the officer-involved shooting.
The Arapahoe County Sheriff’s office is contracted to provide full-time policing services to the city of Centennial. The intersection of Arapahoe and Dayton is located in Greenwood Village, one block past the Centennial border, according to municipal boundaries outlined on Google Maps.