LA COPS PREVENT HOSTAGE TAKER FROM SLITTING WOMAN’S THROAT BY KILLING BOTH OF THEM

'Drop the knife!': Dramatic video shows LAPD officers fatally shooting a man and the woman he was holding hostage at knifepoint

Associated Press
August 1, 2018

Dramatic bodycam footage shows LAPD cops shooting and killing a homeless man and the woman he had taken hostage by holding a knife to her throat.

Guillermo Perez, 32, is seen in the video facing the officers while holding onto Elizabeth Tollison outside the Central Lutheran Church in the Van Nuys section of Los Angeles on June 16.

Officers confronting the homeless man then opened fire when he started cutting her neck. Cops fired nearly 20 times and killed both Perez and Tollison.

It was the first time in 13 years the LAPD shot and killed an innocent bystander or hostage.

Just five weeks later, on July 21, it happened again, when LA cops shot and killed a Trader Joe's assistant manager during a standoff with murder suspect Gene Evin Atkins in the Silver Lakes neighborhood.

Authorities said last week that an officer's bullet killed Melyda Corado before Atkins took hostages inside the store.

'This is another case where officers were forced to make split-second decisions based on the actions of a violent individual,' Police Chief Michel Moore said of the first shooting.

Moore has defended the officers' use of deadly force as an attempt to stop what they feared could become a mass shooting.

The police chief said Tuesday that he was concerned at the average number of rounds fired by officers during shootings had increased last year.

He also said the number of officers involved in those shootings also increased.

The police department will implement a new training program and is exploring how to equip officers with other non-lethal weapons, he said.

In the newly released footage from officers' body-worn cameras, police spotted a suspect, Guillermo Perez, 32, holding a large knife and a metal folding chair outside the Central Lutheran Church on June 16.

They responded to the church that provides food and support for homeless people after a 911 call reported a man had stabbed his ex-girlfriend.

She was taken to the hospital with injuries that were not life-threatening.

'Drop the knife!' an officer repeatedly shouted at Perez, but he ignored the command.

An officer fires several rounds from a bean bag shotgun - which fires a small sack with metal pellets - but Perez appears to use the folding chair to deflect them.

Perez walks backward and approaches a woman, Elizabeth Tollison, who was standing nearby.

He dropped the chair and put the knife to her throat.

Witnesses told police that Perez moved the knife in a 'sawing motion against her throat and cut her throat,' Cmdr. Alan Hamilton said.

Moore told reporters that hostages' lives are a priority and recruits are generally taught to use a 'precise head shot.'

He said an investigation will look at whether the officers' actions align with hostage training.

EDITOR’S NOTE: Didn’t detective Sledge Hammer ignore the pleas of hostage negotiators and blow up a whole LA building with a shoulder-held missile to keep a jumper on top from committing suicide?