A sheriff’s deputy in southern California shot and killed a 15-year-old boy who was holding a gardening tool, officials said.
The San Bernardino county sheriff’s department was responding to a 911 call on Saturday from a family reporting that a boy, identified as Ryan Gainer, was attacking his family at their home in Apple Valley, east of Los Angeles. The department said he was holding a 5ft gardening tool and approaching the first deputy who arrived at the scene when the deputy shot him. Gainer was later taken to a hospital where he died.
A lawyer for the family said Gainer was a cross-country runner who had autism and said the fatal shooting did not appear to be warranted.
The sheriff’s department released 911 audio and partial body-camera footage to the Guardian on Monday, but the clips do not capture the moment of the shooting, and a spokesperson declined to release additional video.
On the call, a woman reported that her brother was attacking one of their sisters and trying to break a window and door. The audio captured yelling in the background, and the woman told the dispatcher: “They gotta take him in.”
During the roughly five-minute call, the woman said the other relatives were trying to keep their distance from him. At one point, she said: “He’s talking to my dad right now. He said he’s going to run away and then he came back to the house.” She also said he had a piece of glass.
The department released two roughly 15-second body-camera clips, but both clips end before the shooting. Footage from one deputy showed him arriving at the home, where the front door was open. A man inside could be heard saying: “He’s got a stick in his hand.” Gainer then appeared and started quickly walking out of the home toward the deputy, who pointed his gun toward the boy and shouted: “Get back, get back, or you’re going to get shot.”
The deputy appeared to be walking backward, then running away from the boy, pointing his gun at him. The other clip captured that same moment from another deputy who was arriving and standing at a distance. Gainer appeared to be holding the tool over his head, but it is unclear what he was doing as he was shot.
A department spokesperson said it would not be releasing full body-camera footage on Monday and declined to say where Gainer was shot, how many bullets were fired and if multiple deputies had shot him. The spokesperson also declined to name the deputies on scene and said the case was still under investigation.
“There are great questions as to whether it was appropriate to use deadly force against a 15-year-old autistic kid who was having an episode,” said DeWitt Lacy, a civil rights lawyer representing the family. “We need to see the video and the moment of the shooting … but it doesn’t seem like anyone was in imminent danger of death or great bodily injury.”
Lacy said it appeared Gainer was potentially hit with three bullets, including in his torso and abdomen. He said he was concerned that the department had refused to disclose the footage of the final moments of the shooting and the aftermath: “We understand the gamesmanship that is involved when municipalities err and kill people unnecessarily.”
The family also reported that the deputies delayed helping Gainer after he was shot, Lacy said. He said: “They have to give medical aid to this 15-year-old they just shot and it certainly seems they failed to do that.” The sheriff department’s initial press release said deputies “quickly rendered medical aid” before paramedics arrived.
Lacy said the family also reported that after the shooting, the family was forced out of the home while officers “rummaged through their house looking for any justification for shooting and killing Ryan”.
In addition to his involvement on a cross-country team, Gainer also wanted to be an engineer, Lacy said.
Shannon Dicus, the elected San Bernardino sheriff, defended the use of lethal force in a statement, saying: “Our social safety net for those experiencing mental illness needs to be strengthened. Our deputies handle seemingly insurmountable calls daily. Most of these calls do not end in violence. However, this one ended in tragedy for Ryan, his family, and for the deputies who responded.
“Rapidly evolving, violent encounters are some of the most difficult, requiring split-second decisions,” Dicus continued. “While these decisions are lawful, they are awful in terms of our humanity. I feel for both Ryan’s family and my deputies who will struggle with this for their entire lives.”
The shooting comes amid growing scrutiny over how police officers and sheriff’s deputies respond to people who are facing mental health crises. The San Bernardino sheriff’s department was sued last year for fatally shooting Tony Garza amid a mental health episode. Lawyers for Garza’s family alleged that he was shot a dozen times as he fled.
The department has faced other recent scandals. In February last year, a jury awarded $375,000 to a truck driver who sued for wrongful arrest; the man was taken into custody after making a snide remark to a San Bernardino deputy who stopped him outside a grocery store. And in December, a deputy resigned after the department investigated a tip that he and a former deputy were “involved in drug activity”.
There have also been growing concerns about how police rush to use lethal force against people holding objects that are not weapons. In February, the Los Angeles police department fatally shot a man who was holding a plastic fork, which followed a string of incidents in which LAPD officers shot people with harmless objects in their hands, including a phone, a bike part and a car part.