Sep 22, 2006 8:46 am US/Central
Family Of Man Shot By Minneapolis Cop Outraged
by Darcy Pohland
Minneapolis (WCCO) ―
Two Minneapolis police officers shot and killed a man late Wednesday night.
Police were called to Bloomington Avenue South and 40th Street East just before midnight. There, officers Lawrence Loonsfoot and Jason King got into an altercation with a suspect which ended in the man's death.
"When you call the police, you think they would solve the situation instead of just killing him," said Chanell Felder, the suspect's sister.
Family members of 27-year-old Dominic Felder are angered after a 911 call for help ended in his death by gunfire.
"He thought people were out to get him. He thought everybody was trying to kill him," said the mother of one of Dominic Felder's two daughters who wouldn't give her name. "He was pacing back and forth, back and forth. He just was mentally ill."
When officers arrived, they were told Felder threatened to kill those in his house and next door. He allegedly smashed the neighbor's window with a 60 pound piece of concrete.
"We thought that if we called they police that they would come and maybe try to calm him down, take him to get help, mental help," said Chanell.
Police say Felder ran from officers. They caught up to him and tried to arrest him.
"The suspect confronted one of the cops then grabbed his gun. Then a knock-down, drag-out struggle ensued with the two officers and the suspect. And during the struggle is when he was shot," said Sgt. John Delmonico president of the Minneapolis Police Federation.
"I told them, 'Do not shoot, he's mental,'" said Felder's sister, Tianna Wilson. "'Do not shoot. He don't have anything.' And they said, with a smart comment, 'Aw, you want us to get him, but you don't want us to shoot.'"
Family members waited for an explanation at a police news conference Thursday, where police chief Tim Dolan revealed that seven rounds were fired in the scuffle. Felder's relatives received very little in the way of answers, but they were able get in a few words.
"They murdered him! And you know what? I'm going to make sure justice is served, believe that," shouted Dominic's aunt Virginia Felder Baker at Dolan during the news conference. "You ain't heard the last from me!"
"The family is obviously upset," said Lt. Greg Reinhardt with the Minneapolis Police Department. "The officers have a responsibility to respond to all types of calls and they have to protect the public and they have to protect themselves."
The police officers involved in the shooting were Lawrence Loonsfoot and Jason King, who are now on paid administrative leave. Both have been with the department for 13 years. The police federation says their record on the force is clean, but it is not the first time the officers have been involved in shootings.
In 2001, King killed a man who confronted him with a gun. King was cleared by a grand jury. Loonsfoot was the partner of an officer who wounded a 15-year-old in 1997.
Dolan wouldn't say if it was officer King or Loonsfoot who shot Felder.
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