After a tense, 11-minute standoff that featured multiple police vehicles and dozens of personnel, three officers unloaded two bursts of fatal gunfire at Nalwood, who allegedy pointed a handgun at them. Nalwood, who later was pronounced dead at a hospital, was the seventh person killed by Phoenix police this year. Last year, Phoenix officers shot and killed 14 people, an increase from 12 in 2023 and 10 in 2022.
Video of Nalwood’s killing was released Monday as part of a “critical incident briefing” created by Phoenix police. The department’s briefings are narrated by officers and made public after any police shooting or in-custody death. In addition to body camera footage, they typically include a limited selection of dispatch audio or surveillance footage from nearby businesses.
However, the body-worn camera footage in the briefing — as well as longer footage obtained by Phoenix New Times as part of a public records request — doesn’t clearly show Nalwood pointing a weapon. Though several officers mention they saw him point a gun, their body-cams are worn at chest level and don’t always capture what an officer sees.
“I couldn’t see what he was doing,” one officer noted to another after the shooting, as captured by his body-cam. “He rolled the window down — when he pulled it out, I fired.”
The longer footage obtained by New Times does show that officers waited roughly 10 minutes to remove Nalwood from his car after the last shot was fired. At that point, ofifcers began performing CPR on the man.
The three officers who fired their weapons were Kyle Snider, Nicholas Gastelum and Michael Ramsey, according to a police advisory. Snider and Gastelum were recently named in a lawsuit after a woman accused them of holding her to hot pavement while they arrested her, an episode that resulted in severe burns requiring hospital treatment. That case is pending in federal court.
Nalwood’s killing is being investigated by the Arizona Department of Public Safety’s Major Incident Division, and Phoenix police are conducting an internal investigation to ensure the officers’ actions were in line with department policy.
‘Force will be used against you’
The briefing video begins with dispatch audio from a woman and a man who called 911 from 35th Avenue and Fillmore Street. The woman told the dispatcher than a man had was “threatening my father” with a gun, while the man reported that the suspect had taken his phone and fired shots at his feet. He described the suspect’s vehicle as a black Toyota Camry with a California license plate.Officers found a vehicle matching that description near Washington Street and 35th Avenue around noon. In a police advisory, department spokesperson Sgt. Lorraine Fernandez noted that the vehicle pulled into a vacant lot, though it’s unclear whether police pulled Nalwood over or whether he had already parked there.
Video footage included in the briefing begins with one officer pointing a gun at the car and repeatedly ordering Nalwood to keep his hands up. The driver’s side door is open.
“If you don’t keep your hands up, force will be used against you,” the officer warned.
“Shoot me,” Nalwood replied, closing the door and getting fully back into the car before flailing his arms out of the window and then opening the door again. “What did I do?”
Shortly thereafter, more officers arrived and maneuvered two police Tahoes to “pinch” Nalwood’s car to prevent him from fleeing. As one police SUV pulled up on the driver’s side, the two officers who originally contacted Nalwood fired through his driver’s side window and back windshield. Police said Nalwood aimed a gun at them, though that isn’t clearly visible in the footage.
“He pointed the gun directly at you,” one of the officers could be heard saying the another a minute after the bullets flew. “I shot him, too.”
Nalwood then tried to drive away, according to the footage, but hit a barrier and was unable to move far. More officers and police vehicles arrived surround Nalwood. One of the officers who shot at Nalwood’s car then fired a less-lethal pepper ball gun at the car’s windows.
Just after the pepper ball shots and eight minutes after the first bullets were fired, a third officer aiming a rifle at the car warned that Nawood had “a gun in the hand.” Several other officers repeated the claim before the officer fired the rifle a dozen times at the car.
It’s unclear how many times Nalwood was shot, but he began wailing in a high-pitched screech. Officers kept their weapons aimed at the car, with the officer who fired the rifle warning, “If that gun comes up again, then just be aware.” Several officers continued to yell at Nalwood to put his hands up. About 70 seconds after the initial rifle shots, the same officer fired two more rounds.
Body camera footage provided to New Times shows that 10 minutes after the last shots were fired — and several minutes after Nalwood stopped making noise — dozens of heavily armed cops surrounded the car, lifted his body from the vehicle by the limbs and placed him on the pavement. His tank top, which one officer had earlier described as white, was now bright red. Another officer could be heard saying that Nalwood had no pulse.
Police said that the Phoenix Fire Department took Nalwood to a hospital, where he was pronounced dead.
