State prosecutors will not charge an Anchorage police officer who shot and killed a man in late September.
In a review letter from the state Office of Special Prosecutions published on Tuesday, investigators found that Anchorage officer James Dokken was legally justified in fatally shooting 24-year-old James Afuvai on Sept. 29.
Afuvai is the eighth person shot by Anchorage police this year, and the fifth to have died as a result. Prosecutors have now found seven of the shootings legally justified, and one — the shooting that wounded Michael Alto — is still under review.
Shortly after the state’s review of Afuvai’s shooting was released, Anchorage police published a series of videos of the incident, including three 911 calls Afuvai made and officer body and dash camera footage.
Police say the first 911 call from Afuvai came at around 7:15 p.m. on Sept. 29. Footage shows him telling dispatchers and officers that someone had shot the window of his Mountain View home the night before, that people were “shooting up” the neighborhood and that he was being threatened by a “crazy guy with a knife.” Afuvai also gave a false name to a dispatcher, and repeatedly asked for police to respond to his home.
“Can you send them, like ASAP?” Afuvai asked in the third 911 call.
In an interview Wednesday, APD chief Sean Case said officers were unable to confirm Afuvai’s claims.
“We went to the scene and what we determined was that he was, in fact, a caller for all those calls,” Case said. “Even the person that he indicates was threatening with a knife… none of that stuff was able to be verified.”
The department’s Mobile Intervention Team, which helps handle mental health crises, was also called to respond to the incident. The team was coming in from South Anchorage, according to the footage.
Footage shows Dokken, the officer, arriving at Afuvai’s location, getting out of his police vehicle and then noticing that a man, later identified as Afuvai, had a knife. Dokken is heard ordering Afuvai to drop the knife as he backs away from Afuvai. Shortly after a second police vehicle showed up and turned on its siren, Afuvai began running towards Dokken with the knife still in his hand. Roughly four seconds after Afuvai started running, Dokken shot him twice.
Case said he agreed with the state that Dokken’s shooting of Afuvai was justified.
“It’s a situation where he provided commands, he tried to take advantage of the short time frame that he had, backed up to provide that distance and time and an individual didn’t drop the knife,” Case said.
Case spoke highly of the other officers who responded to the call. In the footage, an officer in the second patrol vehicle expressed concerns over crossfire with a resident’s truck that was near the incident. The driver of the police vehicle quickly drove between the truck and a curb to get between Dokken’s line of fire and the person in the truck.
“When I watch that sort of stuff, you know, those are proud moments to see that there’s no hesitation whatsoever,” Case said. “That the officers are willing to put themselves in that position, so that there’s not an innocent that gets caught up.”
It’s unclear what led to Afuvai calling the police in the first place, Case said.
“We’re put in a very compressed time frame to try to figure out what exactly is happening,” Case said. “And particularly when they end in a situation like this, where we don’t get to finish the investigation, we don’t get to understand why exactly he called and what the motivation was.”
The Anchorage Police Department has been under scrutiny this year after the high number of police shootings. In response to the August killing of 16-year-old Easter Leafa by police, Mayor Suzanne LaFrance announced a series of reforms to the department, including a third party review of APD policies and training. Case said that review has wrapped up, and is being conducted through the city’s legal department. He said he’s seen the results of the review and they are similar to an internal review of police shootings the department released earlier this month.
“Throughout 2025 we will not only be adding training policy changes for the incoming academy, but we’ll put that same training out to our in-service officers that are in the field,” Case said.
Case said the public can expect the results of the third-party review to be released soon.
Wesley Early covers Anchorage life and city politics for Alaska Public Media. Reach him at wearly@alaskapublic.org and follow him on X at @wesley_early. Read more about Wesley here.
