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San Jose police say arriving officers didn't know suspect they shot dead was mentally ill

 

May 12, 2009
Mercury News
By Sean Webby

San Jose police officers Matthew Blackerby and Brian Jeffrey arrived at the bloody and chaotic Berryessa neighborhood home Sunday not knowing the attacker lurking somewhere inside was mentally ill. Even if they had known, police officials said Tuesday, they would not have acted any differently.

The officers shot and killed Daniel Pham as he threatened them with a knife, after having already slashed his brother.

Family members said in interviews after the shooting that Pham was mentally ill and that they had told that to the responding officers, begging them not to kill him.

But police declined to confirm that officers were told Pham was mentally ill.

"If a person is holding a dangerous weapon, officers need to take immediate action to deal with that," said Sgt. Ronnie Lopez, a police spokesman. "They need to take this action in self-defense or in defense of another person's life."

Tuesday was the first time San Jose police have given a description of what happened leading up to the city's first officer-involved fatal shooting since 2006.

Police described the officers responding to multiple 911 calls and a scene with an injured victim and a dangerous and armed suspect. The first dispatch the patrol officers received was not of a mentally ill suspect, but of an armed and violent man who was ''high on drugs" and "out of control," police said.

As he was arriving, one of the officers asked the dispatcher to check if police had any previous contacts at that address. The dispatcher said there had been prior police contacts there with a man with mental issues. But neither the dispatcher nor the officer associated that with Pham because the previous contact went by an Americanized name — and not the Vietnamese name the officers had been given.

Police declined to give many more details of what happened inside the home other than what has already been reported: On Sunday, just before noon, Brian Pham had been attacked by his 27-year-old brother, who suffered from mental illness and was acting erratic that day, his family said. Unprovoked, Daniel sliced Brian's neck from ear to ear with a knife, family and police said. Brian told his girlfriend to lock herself in a bedroom at the family home on Branbury Way and call 911, Pham family members said.

When the two San Jose police officers arrived, they told Daniel Pham numerous times to drop the knife, according to police. He did not. They Tasered him, and then they ended up shooting him dead.

Police declined to confirm that the brother's girlfriend was trapped inside the home, something the Pham family told the Mercury News on Monday.

Neither Brian Pham, 29, nor his girlfriend, who has not been identified, wanted to speak to the Mercury News on Tuesday, according to Vinh Pham, Brian's 58-year-old father.

They are too devastated to talk, Vinh Pham said.

"They have a big problem in their heads," Pham said, apologizing for his broken English. "I'm afraid. How can they live in the future? They think that they killed Daniel. They're sorry they called police."

According to Vinh Pham, no one from the police department has yet to come to his house to give him any information about the death of his son, whose Mass will be celebrated on Friday at 10:45 a.m. at St. Patrick's Proto-Cathedral Church on East Santa Clara Street, with a burial service afterward.

City Councilman Kansen Chu weighed in Tuesday, saying he ''will make sure that the investigation is full and complete."

"I am saddened by the events that transpired and resulted in a fatal outcome," Chu said in a written statement, "my heartfelt sympathy goes out to the family."





 

Council District 4

 
 
 

Council District 4
200 East Santa Clara Street, San José, CA 95113
tel. (408) 535-4904 fax (408) 292-6459
district4@sanjoseca.gov

 

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