The Denver District Attorney’s Office on Friday filed criminal charges against Jordan Waddy, the man police shot dead outside a LoDo bar last weekend morning in an incident that also left six bystanders injured. by police gunfire.
Waddy, 21, has been charged with three counts of ex-offender possession of a weapon and one count of third-degree assault for his actions in the case, DA Beth McCann said. The charges of possession of firearms are felonies and the charge of assault is a misdemeanor.
Waddy was on parole for aggravated assault at the time of the shooting. He was arrested after Denver police shot him in the abdomen outside the Larimer Beer Hall bar in the 2000 block of Larimer Street around 1:35 a.m. Sunday.
According to testimony from Denver police officials, officers approached Waddy after observing him in an altercation with another man outside the bar. Believing he was carrying a gun, officers confronted Waddy in the middle of the closed street, but he then moved closer to the sidewalk, which was packed with people coming out of bars in the bustling downtown nightlife district. town.
After briefly losing sight of him, officers saw Waddy again, at which point he moved to pull a handgun from his clothes, Denver Police Cmdr. Matt Clark said during a briefing this week.
In a probable cause statement, an officer at the scene reported that Waddy “pointed the gun in their direction.” Three officers later fired a total of seven shots at him. Waddy was injured along with six other people. Three bystanders were seriously injured.
Waddy was arrested on suspicion of a threatening crime and possession of a weapon by a former offender. A loaded gun was recovered from the scene.
When asked why a threatening charge was not filed, Denver District Attorney’s Office spokeswoman Carolyn Tyler said, “Our ethics dictate that we only take cases and file changes that we think we can prove to a jury.”
During Wednesday’s briefing, Clark said Waddy didn’t appear to have his hand on the gun’s “pistol grip” as he removed it from his clothing. Instead, he may have held it by the slide on the top of the gun. It’s unclear if he could have fired the gun as he was holding it, Clark said, but officers believed there was a life-threatening situation.
More people were injured by police in Sunday’s shooting than in any other police shooting in Colorado since at least 2010, when the state began collecting data on police shootings. The incident sparked outrage and demands for accountability from Denver police.
All three officers are on leave while the investigation into the shooting is ongoing. Denver police have released stills from officers’ body-worn cameras, but have no plans to release video footage until the investigation is complete.
“Looking back, six bystanders were injured, and I think you have to conclude that something could have been done differently,” Clark said this week. “But for now, they were doing what they could to stop the violence and keep downtown safe.”
Additional court dates have yet to be set in Waddy’s case.
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