We had an officer involved fatal shooting at my agency about 40 years ago. A man was reported to be swinging an axe one morning around people and especially children in the neighborhood. One officer tried to distract the man while another officer risked his life trying to sneak up on the suspect from behind and tackle him while grabbing the arm with the axe.
The guy heard the officer sneaking up behind him and raised the axe to strike the officer. One shot was fired and the man with the axe was killed.
That wasn’t the story though. The odd part was when the media showed and asked a commanding officer something like, did you have to try to tackle the man and could you have simply left the scene without using dead force?
The lieutenant responded with…. Sure, we could’ve left the same. There was a man swinging an axe around citizens and especially children but we could’ve driven away and left it with them. Is that why we hired the police?