A police chase in Phoenix, Arizona, came to an end with officers firing at least four shots through the windshield of an SUV after it had been forced off the road and surrounded.
The driver of the SUV was a suspect in a bank robbery and was pronounced dead at the scene, according to a report from KPNX, a local NBC affiliate.
The chase was being shown live on local television when police in three unmarked vehicles successfully cornered the fleeing SUV. As local newscasters described the scene, a police officer lept from an unmarked silver pickup truck and fired several rounds through the front windshield of the suspect's vehicle. The overhead view of the shooting made it impossible to see whether the driver or any passengers in the SUV were armed or threatening the officers.
On FOX 10's live coverage, anchors were in the middle of praising the cops for a "nice pit manuever" when the shots were fired. A producer in the background of the video can be heard shouting "get off, get off" as the station quickly cut to a news conference with Rudy Guiliani (supply your own gallows humor about that) and then to a weather forecast.
Here's a video of the incident from another Phoenix TV station—if the first four paragraphs of this post didn't make it clear, it's a bit graphic:
It's not the first time a police chase in Phoenix has ended with a shooting broadcast on live TV. In 2014, police opened fire on a man wielding a machete after they forced him off the road in a pursuit (again, it's graphic).
Comments