Horrifying moment police shoot and kill man who called for help
The family of a 22-year-old man who was shot and killed by police after calling them for help are demanding accountability.
On June 11, Christian Glass was driving in the small mountain town of Silver Plume, west of Denver in Colorado, when his car broke down.
New footage from the night has since been released and shows the 22-year-old's final moments.
“Christian was experiencing a crisis, and he called 911 for help,” his parents’ attorney, Siddhartha Rathod, said.
"And yet these officers busted out Christian’s window, shot him six times with bean bag rounds, Tased him multiple times from two Tasers, and then shot him five times."
Man 'terrified' in car as police try to get him out
When Clear Creek County Sheriff's deputies arrived at the scene, they asked Glass to get out of the vehicle.
Police eventually busted his car window and claimed he was shot after he became "argumentative and uncooperative" and tried to stab an officer when police broke a car window to grab him.
In the video, Glass tells the deputies he is "terrified" and is seen making heart shapes with his hands at the officers.
He then folds his hands and starts praying, asking God for the officers to not break the car's window.
Before police arrived on the scene, Glass had told the emergency dispatcher that he had two knives, a hammer and a rubber mallet, CBS News reported.
This was because Glass was an amateur geologist.
When the officers did break the window, Glass seemed to panic and grabbed a knife.
Police then shot Glass with bean bag rounds and shocked him with a stun gun before the young man twisted in his seat and thrust a knife toward an officer, the footage showed.
Then one officer fired his gun, hitting Glass. The recordings then show Glass stabbing himself before he died.
Rathod said Glass had no history of mental illness. When asked about his unusual behaviour, Rathod responded by saying "unfortunately we are not ever going to know."
An autopsy report revealed Glass died of gunshot wounds and also said he had THC, a .01 per cent blood alcohol concentration, and amphetamine in his system.
The amphetamine is likely from his ADHD prescription.
The shooting comes amid a national outcry for police reforms focused on crisis intervention, de-escalation and alternative policing programs.
In Denver and New York, behavioural health specialists are sent to 911 callers facing crises that police may not be trained to address or could even exacerbate.
Police haven’t said if any behavioural health specialists were called for Glass.
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Family calls for prayers
During a press conference on Tuesday (local time), Glass' mum Sally Glass held up a pendant of Jesus that had been recovered from her son's car and had the words "Pray for us" engraved on it.
She tearfully addressed the crowd and called for the US to be "less violent".
"We have to pray for us in America to make this a less violent country," she said.
"I think a lot of people now would agree that there is a systemic problem with policing: It’s too aggressive. They escalate at every opportunity, and it looks like they are spoiling for a fight."
She added that police should be protecting citizens, not "attacking" them.
"Christian's killing is a stain on Clear Creek County and on Colorado," father Simon Glass said according to CBS Colorado.
"It was a murder by a Colorado official that cannot stand. It is not right."
With AP
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