Authorities said earlier this week that five Topeka police officers who shot and killed Taylor Lowery, the man who charged the officials with a knife last year, would not face any charges.
In an Associated Press report, Shawnee County District Attorney Mike Kagay said Topeka police reasonably believed that the 33-year-old Taylor Lowery threatened them and the general public in a fight at a Kwik Shop parking lot on October 13.
HESSTON, KS – FEBRUARY 26: Cars sit behind police tape the day after a shooting on February 26, 2015 in Hesston, Kansas. A gunman killed three people and wounded at least 14, Thursday, February 25, 2016. The shooter was killed by police. (Photo by Kyle Rivas/Getty Images)
Officers Shot, Killed Man in Kansas Shooting: What led to the October 13 police shooting?
Kagay said that cops opened fire 34 times after Lowery charged at them with a knife and socket wrench.
When Lowery was shot, Kagay claimed that he was under the influence of narcotics.
Fox News reported that the suspect’s sister called the police after claiming he was attempting to break into the bedroom where someone locked her.
Taylor Lowery then drove to the Kwik Shop while waving a knife at the police. According to the report, when they ordered him to lay down his firearm, he attempted to carjack a vehicle.
Two cops shot him as he charged at them with a knife. Despite seeming to have “went down,” Lowery sprang back up, seized a socket wrench, and moved toward an officer before being shot by three other policemen, according to the report.
Nobody else suffered harm.
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Incident Caught on Body Camera
Topeka police chief Bryan Wheeles told The Topeka Capital-Journal that five officers were placed on paid administrative leave, as is customary for the Topeka Police Department.
The police officers involved put themselves at immediate risk of death to carry out their duty to safeguard the public, according to Kagay’s report. The only way they could successfully put a stop to the threat that Lowery presented was by using lethal force.
The position where the conversation took place was in a blind region of the Kwik Shop cameras, according to Kagay’s report, and the sergeant and detective who shot Lowery at first weren’t assigned or wearing body cameras.
The report said that the other cops’ body cams captured what transpired after the first bullets were fired.
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