Anchorage police say an officer shot and killed a driver who had a gun late Monday during a Mountain View traffic stop.
Police spokesman Christopher Barraza said the shooting took place shortly after 11:30 p.m. Monday, near Bragaw Street and Peterkin Avenue.
Officers had pulled over the Chevrolet Equinox SUV for a headlight issue. The driver had a female passenger in the car.
Barraza said officers asked the driver if he had any weapons in the vehicle. He told them he didn’t.
“One of the officers opened the passenger door, saw a gun on the suspect's lap,” Barraza said. “They had then gave him commands to put his hands up, to not touch the gun. He obviously did not react to the commands, and our officers then shot.”
In a news conference early Tuesday, Police Chief Sean Case said the officer fired one round, striking the driver who was pronounced dead at the scene.
He said the department was still investigating the shooting. He said while the gun was in the driver’s “lap area,” it was not immediately clear from officers’ body camera footage whether the driver was holding the gun before he was shot.
Case said the body camera footage was obscured by lighting issues, reflections from vehicle windows and motion blur.
“It's difficult to see from the video, so that's why we’ve got to wait for the officers to be able to confirm what they saw,” he said.
Barraza said in an interview later Tuesday that a handgun was recovered from the SUV and there was no sign that it had been fired during the incident.
In the next few days, Case said, police will release more information about the shooting including the driver’s name.
The shooting will also be reviewed by the state Office of Special Prosecutions.
The driver shot Monday is the 13th person shot by Anchorage police in the past year. Eight of those people have died.
