 All right, well, good afternoon. Thank you all for coming. I'm here today with Major Crimes Division Commander Matt Clark, here to talk about two critical incidents that both occurred on the same day, October 19th of last week. Before I turn it over to Matt Clark, I just want to set the stage that earlier today we provided the videos associated with both of these incidents, and we will now just provide an overview based upon our follow-up investigation to this point. So thank you, Matt. Thanks, Chief. All right, can you hear me OK? Thank you. Well, good afternoon. Thanks for being here. I'm Matt Clark, the commander of the Major Crimes Division for the Denver Police Department. I appreciate the opportunity to provide an update regarding two police shooting incidents that occurred on Thursday, October 19th, 2023. These are intended to be follow-up briefings based upon information we've gathered after interviewing numerous witnesses, speaking with the involved officers, and analyzing evidence that was collected at the scene. Criminal charges are currently pending in these cases, so there may be information I'm not able to disclose, but to the degree we are able, we'll answer any questions at the conclusion here. We'll just go in chronological order. I'll start with the first incident that occurred in the area of 46th North Avenue in York Street. On Thursday, October 19th, 2023, around 2.35 in the afternoon, the Denver Communication Center received a 911 call from an individual who was reporting a male was in the area pointing a firearm at individuals. This was in the 3,000 block of East 45th Avenue near the Burger King location. The complaint provided a description of the subject, and that description was relayed to the responding officers. Officers arrived in the area shortly after being dispatched and contacted the victim. He specifically advised the officers that he was headed to the Burger King. He was driving west on 45th Avenue from Steel Street when he observed a male in front of him walking in the street slowly. The victim continued slowly driving behind the individual and intentionally did not engage him, did not honk at him or do anything to get his attention. At one point, the subject turned around towards the victim while he was driving the vehicle and pointed a firearm directly at him. The subject then quickly turned around and began continuing westbound again on 45th Avenue. He was also seen pointing a firearm in the Burger King or towards the Burger King location on 45th Avenue there. While officers were in contact with the victim, a separate officer who responded to assist in checking the area was in plain clothes, driving an unmarked vehicle and located an individual matching the subject's description near the area of 45th Avenue and Josephine Street. The officer began monitoring the suspect while waiting for additional information from the officers who were with the victim. At one point, the undercover officer who was in his vehicle observed the subject retrieve a firearm from a bag or backpack that he was carrying. While holding the firearm in his right hand, the subject directed his attention towards the undercover officer and began walking towards his vehicle. The subject stopped several feet from the driver's door of the undercover vehicle. The plain clothes officer was specifically concerned that he would be shot in his vehicle by this individual. So he exited his vehicle, drew his firearm and identified himself as a police officer. Despite being in plain clothes, the officer was wearing a tactical vest over his outer layer of clothing, which had police insignia that identified him as a police officer. The officer gave specific commands to drop the firearm, which were ignored. The subject turned around from the officer and walked away, still holding the firearm in his right hand. Uniformed officers in three separate marked vehicles quickly arrived to provide assistance. Officers followed the subject as he walked northbound on Josephine Street from 46 South Avenue. Now, Josephine Street in that area goes over the below grade section of I-70 and this particular portion is bordered by 46 South Avenue and 46 North Avenue. While officers were behind the subject, they continued to direct him to drop the firearm that he was holding. The subject disregarded these commands and continued northbound. When he reached 46 North Avenue, the subject went westbound and started yelling at officers to shoot me, shoot me. Despite the lack of a suitable barrier to protect the officers, they continued following the subject while attempting to gain his compliance. This included verbal communication by the officers with specific commands, as well as efforts to determine if he needed assistance. Officers were aware that he had pointed a firearm at the original victim and were concerned for safety of the people in the area if he were to be allowed to continue without them maintaining a very close visual proximity. The subject continued moving westbound in the middle of 46th Avenue North. He was facing away from the, or excuse me, he was facing the officers as he walked backwards away from them on 46th Avenue North towards York Street. At this point, there were five officers including the undercover detective, four others who were in uniform in the area, following the subject as he moved down 46th Avenue North. The officers estimated there were approximately 30 yards from the subject while he was walking away. When the subject began walking into the intersection of 46th North Avenue in York Street, he stopped briefly and raised the gun before quickly lowering it. A few seconds later, the suspect raised his right hand, which had the gun and he pointed to the firearm directly at the officers in the roadway. The officers feared he was preparing to shoot at them and they discharged their firearms. The officers stopped firing their weapons when they believed the subject was no longer posing a deadly threat. The subject was struck and fell to the ground. Officers immediately called for an ambulance to respond and quickly began life-saving efforts and that included the application of a tourniquet and the use of medical gauze pads to control the bleeding until the paramedics arrived. The subject was transported to the hospital by ambulance and he continues to remain at the hospital receiving treatment for his injuries. He is expected to survive. Through the investigation, it was determined that four Denver Police fall officers fired a total of 12 rounds from their duty handgun. The closest officer was approximately 59 feet away from the individual. One shots were fired and the furthest officer was about 72 feet away. Investigators recovered a black CO2 gun that is capable of firing BB or pellet type projectiles. That gun was on the ground near the location where the subject was apprehended. The black gun closely resembles a semi-automatic firearm. This is the gun the subject held throughout the interaction with officers. Investigators interviewed the original 911 caller as well as another individual who reported that the subject pointed the firearm at him. The second victim told investigators that he was sitting inside of the Burger King restaurant on 45th Avenue. He was at a table that was adjacent to the window on the 45th Avenue side and explained that the male subject was on the sidewalk, pointed the firearm at him in his seat and began firing. He discharged that weapon several times. The projectiles that were fired did not penetrate the glass or window frame but did leave defects in both. The subject has been identified as 36-year-old Ruben Sanez, S-A-E-N-Z. Preliminary information indicates Mr. Sanez was struck multiple times. He was hit in the arm and the torso. The district attorney's office has formally charged Mr. Sanez with seven counts of felony menacing. As it relates to the officers, the officers who discharged their weapons in this incident are all assigned to the District 2 station, which is in northeast Denver. The plainclothes officer is a detective in the District 2 narcotics unit. He's been with the department for 30 years and was involved in a prior police shooting incident in 1997. The three uniformed officers are also assigned to District 2 in the patrol division. One has been with the department since 2019. He was involved in a prior police shooting incident in 2021. The other two have been with the department since 2022 and have not been involved in a prior incident. The officer's body-worn cameras were activated and captured the shooting incident. The involved officers will be placed in a modified duty status as they complete the department's reintegration program. Let me go through a couple of slides regarding this particular incident, and then we'll answer any questions. So these will be clips from the body-worn cameras. The department has released their clips from the body-worn cameras that were released. And so if you choose not to watch the body camera or just for reference, I'll show. So we're on the corner of 46 North Avenue and Josephine Street at this point. And the officers are approaching him, trying to give him commands. As you can see, he's holding the firearm pointed at the ground in this picture with a pistol-type grip on his right side. The next photo is on 46 North Avenue. He is facing officers walking backwards. He's walking westbound. This road, if you continue straight, will provide an on-ramp to westbound I-70, which is below grade. And again, the firearm remains in his right hand there. This is just prior to a couple of frames before shots are fired by officers. Mr. Sayon has raised his arm. He's holding it up. He is not lowered like he did previously. And the officers fear he's gonna fire and they discharge their weapons at this point. This is a photograph from the Burger King location where we had a victim sitting at the booth table inside the location there. There's six defects visible, three in the glass and three in the window frame. This is a crime scene photograph of the recovered CO2 firearm that appears similar to a semi-automatic firearm that Mr. Sayon has possessed throughout his interaction with the officers. Any questions? Yes, ma'am? So the dog, it was not his dog. The dog belonged to an ex-girlfriend of his who lives in Southern Colorado. The dog's name is Stallone and we're able to report that Stallone was reunited with the owner. Just an instance of what he has. You see the officers approaching him down the street. One officer saying, how can I help you? And seconds later, another officer says I'm gonna shoot you. Is that part of training and de-escalation? Do you work to kind of try to mitigate that? To the degree they're able to, the best approach tactically is to have one individual communicating with the subject so that we're not giving multiple commands, we're not giving contradictory commands or giving different direction potentially. But the officers explained that they had specific concerns that they were trying to communicate. There was certainly a recognition in an effort to try to see what's your name, what do you need, that type of thing, how can we help you? Well, at the same time, trying to gain compliance and have him drop that firearm that posed an immediate threat. Multiple, I don't, I know he was hit multiple times and it's an arm and torso injuries. I know you sat in the hospital still, but is there a condition at this point? I'm just, the last time I was told that he's survivable, I don't have a specific condition. I know he's stable at the hospital. Airsoft type, these airsoft guns that look like real police shootings, is that something you all are considering in terms of higher training officers to recognize them, or are they just look so similar? It's not possible to do that. I think it's very difficult the way that some of these firearms are made to try and make, there's no, sometimes there's no distinguishing rather than what the actual projectile that comes out of the weapon is. I'll move on to the next incident. Yes, ma'am. Do you have a timeline on the internal and DA's investigation? The district attorney's filed the criminal case against Mr. Sayan is, the investigators will turn over the case for their consideration. I don't have a timeline on what that looks like in terms of their review, but once the, that review is completed, it will come back to the department and then the administrative will start at that point. Thank you. All right. Later the same day, on Thursday, October 19th, 2023, around 6.15, there were four uniformed Denver police officers who were working in an off-duty capacity at the Whole Foods grocery store in the 1700 block of Owada Street. The off-duty officers were hired by the business to provide a specific police presence in the store and to be available to handle any issues that occurred at the location. At around 6.15, one of the officers who was positioned on the lower level of the store observed a male enter the business through the Owada Street entrance. The male caught the officer's attention because he appeared out of it. The officer greeted the male, but did not receive a response and the male continued walking past. The officer had no further interaction with him at this point and continued his activities monitoring the store. At 6.17, store surveillance captured the male walking behind the deli counter, which is on the Owada side of the store, while employees were in the area, the subject grabbed a large butcher-style knife that was near a food preparation station in the deli. Two store employees observed this and frantically waved to that same officer to get his attention. The employees indicated they needed the officer to come over for assistance. The officer went to the area and saw the male subject now standing outside in the customer area in front of the deli counter, holding the butcher-style knife in his right hand by his side. The officer notified the other uniformed officers that were present that he needed assistance and they all quickly came to the area. With four officers present, one of the officers began calmly communicating with the subject to gain his compliance and peacefully resolve the situation. The subject generally remained in the same area while continuing to hold the knife at his side at times in front of him. At times it was recognized that he pointed the tip of the knife into his chest and even was pushing in and then he would move it back in front of him. At 6.24, the subject again went behind the counter and switched the knife that he was holding. He put the butcher knife down and grabbed a different knife, which was a 13-inch kitchen serrated blade type knife. The officers worked to communicate with the subject for nearly 12 minutes and during that time an officer attempted to engage the suspect in a dialogue subject, in a dialogue to understand the situation and his needs. He was offered food, a place to stay. He was offered access to a hospital, money and opportunity to charge a cell phone. And this was all done in an intentional effort to de-escalate and safely resolve the incident. Other officers who were present were simultaneously working to clear the area of any customers or employees that were still there. Throughout the incident, the subject remained non-compliant and did not engage in a dialogue with the officers. Recognizing the individual was possibly suffering from a mental health episode, the officers requested available on-duty mental health resources respond to the location. The way this situation developed, however, was quicker than the resources were able to respond to the location. So there were no mental health clinicians at the scene at the time. Additional on-duty uniformed officers were notified of the incident via the police radio and responded to provide assistance. Several less lethal systems were available inside the store, including taser devices and a 40 millimeter less lethal sponge round launcher. After nearly 12 minutes of unfruitful communication efforts, officers described seeing the mail begin to move towards the location of uniformed officers who were positioned in the bakery area. While he previously moved slowly and would stay relatively in the same location, this was different and the officers recognized he seemed intentional in his movement as he began directing towards these officers. Fearing he may be preparing to use a knife to assault an officer. One officer discharged a taser and another officer discharged a firearm. This occurred nearly simultaneously. The round fired by the officer did not impact the subject. The taser was effective and it allowed officers to safely take the individual into custody. He was then transported to an area hospital for evaluation and once medically cleared was held for investigation of felony menacing. Through the investigation, it was determined that one Denver police officer fired one round from her duty handgun. The round impacted the front facing glass of an end the side panel of a freezer that was directly behind the subject. Investigators recovered a 13 inch knife with a serrated blade on the ground near the location where the subject was taken into custody. This knife was one that belonged to the store. It was one that was previously in the deli preparation area. The subject been identified as 33 year old Latif Robinson. Mr. Robinson is currently being held for investigation of felony menacing, but we are working with the district attorney's office as well as our internal mental health resources and well power to determine what mental treatment options are available for him. The officer who discharged for firearm is assigned to the department's recruitment unit. She's been with the department since 2020 and has not been involved in a prior police shooting incident. Her body worn camera and those of the other officers were activated at the time and did capture the interaction with Mr. Robinson as well as the weapon discharge. And the officer involved in this will be in a modified duty status as she completes the reintegration program. This investigation and the prior are being conducted in accordance with our critical incident protocol with involvement from the Colorado Bureau of Investigations, the Colorado State Patrol and the Denver Police Homicide Unit and the Denver District Attorney's Office. The investigation is monitored by the Office of the Independent Monitor. Anyone with information on either incident that we haven't spoken to or has additional information or video, we'd request that they contact the Denver Police Department or Crime Stoppers. I'll conclude with that and just briefly jump through the slides and then answer any questions you may have. This is in front of the deli of Whole Foods where on the Wawada Street side behind the officer is the Wawada Street entrance. In front of the officer is the area of the bakery and at this point, we see Mr. Robinson with the butcher knife. He's just come out from behind the counter and he's holding it in his left hand. He switches the knife. It's now in this frame, a little time later, he's moved to his right hand and this is again, he generally stays in the same area. He moves around slowly, nothing purposeful with that. But he eventually makes his way back and he's back against the freezer area and the bakery. You have officers still in front of the deli area and then officers in front of the bakery trying to address him. He's got the knife in his right hand at this point. And then this is just prior to the shot being fired. The officer who deployed as a taser and then this is the view from the officer who fired her weapon that as Mr. Robinson has now turned and made movements towards their position there. The freezer that is hit is the far back door. It's hit by the gun, the round that's fired. This is a photograph of the knife that was recovered that he was holding as he's standing in front of those freezers. Any questions on that incident? No, I mean, what's your knife? It's like stabbing capability. That weapon is more serrated and kind of taken into consideration when you're looking at a situation like this. I think that's still would still be a deadly weapon and the officers would respond, whether it's the butcher knife or that one that could cause significant injury or death to somebody. I know it happens quickly but there's the taser and then the gunshot. When you're let be freeze-frame when the gunshot happens, there is no officer in here. Do you know why if you shot? The officer explained she was concerned about other officers who were nearby her. It may appear there's a significant distance but it is closer than it probably appears on the camera there. So she's concerned for her safety specifically. She articulated as well as the other officers who were present. Tactically, I know if they are that close, should they have been further back? There's a number of options and some of the concerns that the officer articulated was while the area in front of them appears clear, there are still customers and people moving about the store that didn't heed the immediate warnings to leave the area. And there's also concern of people in the bakery area. And it's not visible unless you look from the camera from the Wawa to entrance but there's a pass through into the back, the employee part of the bakery too, that there was concern that there was people there. So the officers maintained that proximity to contain him is what they described but to also protect and provide a barrier for others that were still in the store. The split second use of it, do you usually wait to see if the taser is effective? I mean, I hear that officer asking the other officer to have the taser cockpit ready. Is there a moment where you wait and say, is that gonna work? Some situations yield to that. The officer specifically described that she felt at that point that this was a deadly force situation that somebody was gonna get injured or killed if she didn't utilize the weapon system that she had available and that was her firearm. The reintegration is something that the department's done for several years and we've piloted it. It's been mirrored around the country. It's a rather robust officer centric process to give the officers what we refer to as a tactical pause. It takes them offline. It provides intentional outreach and contact with the officer. They go through a police psychologist connection and conversations. They'll go through decisional shooting scenarios with our virtuous simulators and they'll get a series of different scenarios and increasing complexity so that the department can assess their reaction to those scenarios. They'll go through live fire training at our range. Similarly, increasingly complex scenarios. They'll work through different things that the academy will address any needs that they have in terms of processing the trauma that they've been through, helping their family. They return to the scene, which is an important aspect, take them back to the scene in a controlled environment so that we can see how they're responding to that scenario as well. And then they transition back into the district. So it's just a consistent process that the department uses when somebody discharges their firearm so that we can make sure that the officer is healthy and ready to go back and everybody's comfortable with that. At least eight weeks, typically. It can go longer. Again, it's officer kind of dependent. So some officers need more time and the flexibility is there to allow that. Chief, you want to address? We may never know the answer to that question. I mean, I think certainly one could think that confronting an officer with something that's actually not a handgun could lead to that thought process. Who knows what particular mental health crisis this other individual with the knife was going through certainly was not our intention and either one of those incidents to have to use force, but I think the best outcome of both of the situations would have been for them to drop the objects that they had in their hand. For programming, I know that you said that you don't Well, so this would, neither one of these situations would have been appropriate for STAR because of the arm component there. So, you know, STAR is specifically reserved for situations where there was no one who is armed with weapons since we're only talking about paramedics and mental health clinicians. Can they work in co-work with your officers? So what is probably more appropriate if available for a situation like this would be a co-responder. So these are mental health clinicians that ride alongside police officers. It just so happened in the first incident that none of the officers that were first to respond had a co-responder with them. This other incident that happened with the four officers that were assigned to that store, there was no clinician that was assigned to work that store. Certainly, if there were was a co-responder that was available that could have gotten there in time for them to intervene then that would have been the best situation. Excuse me if I missed this, but was there a criminal history for these? So we don't address criminal histories in these types of scenarios. Certainly we provided the information about who the individuals are. Is it your birthday? I'll make sure the media relations team has that. Do we or the subjects have a home address and could they be considered homeless people? I don't believe that these individuals were unhoused. I'm not positive, but from what I have heard so far I don't believe it to be unhoused. The second time in four months we've been here to talk about two incidents in a day involving officers shooting and firing arms and I know that there have been these situations but it's hard to keep them kind of stacking up. Certainly a concern, certainly a concern. I don't think that it's anything that any officer looks forward to doing, having to use force, but I trust that the women and men that go out and perform this job every day do so with the intention to protect the community. I don't know that that's something that we're necessarily seeing. I mean, what we are seeing is more armed individuals and so we certainly have opportunity to contact more armed individuals. Certainly we recover, I think we're up to about 1800 illegal firearms recovered thus far this year, more than any other year previously and thankfully the overwhelming majority of those incidents are managed without anybody having to use force. I'd like to get your input on Katie's question originally about the idea of these weapons that look like real weapons. What kind of danger does that pose? Well, it certainly poses a danger because they do look like real weapons and I don't think it's reasonable for us to be able to try to make that distinction. I think that there's sometimes we're unable to make that distinction even if we were to see a side-by-side comparison. I think that obviously I'm not gonna be the one that makes that legal determination. It's gonna be the district attorney, but certainly I think that it's appropriate for an officer who believes that they are being threatened by a deadly weapon to respond with force. There's no markings on these guns. Is there orange paint or anything? No, I mean, as I think you saw, there was no orange tip on this. I think if you were to take a close look at this weapon you would have seen something on the grip that looked like not something that you would typically see on a firearm, but as he's holding it in his fist, that's not something you'd be able to see. Nor would you be able to see the cartridge that's inside. Factors who make these weapons. Excuse me? Is that on the manufacturers who make these weapons? Should they be taking more precautions to make them look like fake weapons? Well, certainly a concern of mine and I would imagine a public concern as well when we have people that are carrying around implements that look very much like real weapons. I think not only was it those police officers who felt threatened by that weapon, it was the individual inside of the Burger King, excuse me, and others in the neighborhood that also felt as though they were endangered from this individual. Not only are there more real guns probably than ever on the streets, we have fake guns that look like real guns as well. And I would imagine they go hand in hand. I would imagine that because there are individuals who feel threatened by the fact that there is an overwhelming presence of real handguns that if they can't get their hands on a real handgun, maybe they can defend themselves with something that's not a real handgun. Thank you.