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Daniel Shaver, unarmed man killed by Arizona police officer, cried and begged for life before shooting.
A witness and a transcription of officer video footage describe Daniel Shaver saying “Please don’t shoot me” and “Please don’t shoot,” just before an officer later identified as Philip “Mitch” Brailsford fired his service weapon.
Brailsford has been charged with second-degree murder and was terminated from the police department.
On Tuesday, the Mesa Police Department released the police report, 911 calls and other material from its investigation of Brailsford’s shooting of Daniel Shaver, who was unarmed, at a hotel in January.
The material released did not include officers’ body camera video from the scene.
Daniel Shaver, 26, died after being shot Jan. 18 in a hallway outside his room at a Mesa La Quinta Inn & Suites. Brailsford was charged March 4 with one count of second-degree murder in a direct complaint by the County Attorney’s Office.
Maricopa County Attorney Bill Montgomery said body-camera footage obtained from the officer was used in his office’s review of the case. The fatal shooting was the result of unjustified deadly force, Montgomery said.
The county attorney’s complaint stated Brailsford was “manifesting an extreme indifference to human life recklessly causing the death of another.”
Daniel Shaver’s widow, Laney Sweet, said earlier this month that she had grown more and more frustrated with the lack of details made available to the public, including the circumstances surrounding her husband’s death, two months after it occurred. They are the parents of two young girls.
“I can’t bring him back, but I will fight for justice for him,” Sweet said. “My kids are absolutely heartbroken, and I can’t fix it.”
Court records indicate Daniel Shaver could have been intoxicated at the time of his death and may not have understood what police were asking.
Officers were called to the La Quinta Inn shortly after 9 p.m. MST when guests at the pool reported seeing a person with a gun in a fifth-story window, police said.
Officers arrived at Daniel Shaver’s hotel room and found him with an unidentified woman, whom Sweet said was visiting with a male colleague who had stepped outside to call his wife.
An unarmed Daniel Shaver and the woman were ordered to leave the hotel room and were then told to get on their hands and knees into the hallway, the county attorney’s office said. The woman crawled toward the officers and was apprehended without incident.
“Daniel Shaver was cooperative, but sometimes confused by the commands and because of his possible intoxication,” the report said. “The sergeant told Daniel Shaver that if he put his hands behind his back then he would be shot.”
Records indicate that Brailsford shot Shaver as Shaver made a motion with his right hand toward his waistline, possibly to pull his shorts up because they were sagging, the report said. Shaver was declared dead at the scene.
Investigators later found two pellet guns in Daniel Shaver’s room, police said.
Autopsy results released Thursday by the Maricopa County Medical Examiner state that Daniel Shaver was shot five times; once in the neck, the upper back, left chest, right thigh and a graze wound on his left cheek.
“Significant sites of injury included the heart and left lung, with a large amount of bleeding into the left chest cavity,” the medical examiner’s report reads. Two of Daniel Shaver’s cervical vertebrae, one rib on his left side and multiple areas of soft tissue were also injured.
“Numerous” metal fragments were recovered during the autopsy, according to the medical examiner.
The toxicology report shows that Daniel Shaver had a blood alcohol level of .27. No drugs were detected in his system.
“Toxicology testing was positive for elevated amounts of ethanol,” the report states.
Agencies/Canadajournal
