NEW YORK -- Footage of two New York City police officers opening fire at a subway station as they confronted a man holding a knife shows they shot at him as he was standing still, his arms by his side and his back to a train.In the days since Sunday’s shooting, police officials have repeatedly emphasized that the officers fired after Derell Mickles “charged" at one of them, and when their attempts to deescalate the situation and use Tasers had failed — leaving them with little choice but to resort to deadly force to protect themselves and passengers.The footage, uploaded to the NYPD's YouTube page Friday, offers a different view of the shooting that not only wounded Mickles but also a bystander, who was hit in the head with a stray bullet.
Gregory Delpeche, 49, was sent to the hospital in critical condition, where doctors had to open up his skull to reduce brain swelling, according to his family.“The NYPD’s version of events is a gross mischaracterization of what we see on that video,” said Nick Liakas, an attorney representing Delpeche’s family.“There was no need for any bullets to fly in the subway station, especially in a setting where the officers put innocent bystanders at risk.
And it resulted in Gregory getting shot in the back of the head.”Police officials defended the officers in a news conference Wednesday.“It happened because an individual decided to enter our subway system.He refused to drop that weapon, after repeated orders by the officers.
And then he advanced towards the officers while he was armed," the NYPD interim commissioner, Thomas Donlon, said.NYPD Chief of Patrol John Chell described the shooting as a “tragic situation” and said “we did the best we could to protect our lives and the lives of people on that train.”As Chell described it, Mickles jumped a turnstile at a subway station in the Brownsville neighborhood of Brooklyn a little after 3 p.m.Sunday.
The two officers asked the 37-year-old Brooklyn native to ...