A Metro Nashville Police Department (MNPD) officer killed a suspect Wednesday night after a brief shootout.
“Fatal police shooting under investigation on Old Hickory Blvd W in Madison. Citizens called to report this abandoned Impala in the traffic lane with doors open & the sounds of gunfire from nearby woods. Officers repeatedly ordered the gunman to emerge & surrender…” MNPD said on Twitter.
Fatal police shooting under investigation on Old Hickory Blvd W in Madison. Citizens called to report this abandoned Impala in the traffic lane with doors open & the sounds of gunfire from nearby woods. Officers repeatedly ordered the gunman to emerge & surrender… pic.twitter.com/dINxFmxcYT
— Metro Nashville PD (@MNPDNashville) December 16, 2021
“Despite repeated commands to surrender, the gunman continued to fire. Officer Ricardo Cruz, a 2 yr MNPD veteran, returned the fire with his dept issued shotgun. The gunman died at the scene,” MNPD continued.
The police department “tentatively” identified the suspect as a 39-year-old man. It says a warrant had been issued for the man’s arrest Wednesday morning for allegedly tampering with a court-ordered electronic monitoring system.
MNPD spokesman Don Aaron issued a long statement on the shooting:
Officer Cruz is a two-year Metro Police Department veteran. He’s in his 20s. Certainly, he didn’t come to work last night at 10:30 thinking he was going to be involved in this. Every day our officers want every citizen to go home safe and themselves to go home safe. Unfortunately, there are circumstances our officers find themselves in to no account of their own in which they have to use force to protect themselves and to protect this community. This was the situation this morning of a man whose behavior still needs to be checked as to why this happened, of a man who abandons a car, is in the woods, is shooting a gun. The officers repeatedly ask him to come out and stop doing that and surrender. He continues to shoot and ultimately fires twice more with officers in plain view, prompting the officers to respond in defense of themselves.”
The Tennessee Bureau of Investigation is reportedly leading the investigation into the shooting. Cruz’s body camera footage will be examined and is expected to be released to the public.
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Pete D’Abrosca is a contributor at The Tennessee Star and The Star News Network. Follow Pete on Twitter. Email tips to [email protected].
Photo “Crime Scene” by Metro Nashville Police Department.
