A 21-year-old man who on Monday morning was shot and killed by Santa Monica Police officers after he reportedly turned toward them with a gun in his hand died instantly from multiple gunshot wounds, according to a preliminary autopsy report released Wednesday by the Los Angeles County Coroner.
Lt. Fred Corral, a spokesman for the coroner’s office, said it appears that there were multiple gunshots in more than one location of Christopher Hunter’s body. While the preliminary report didn’t contain information on the location or number of the wounds, witnesses to the shooting said they heard at least six shots fired.
Hunter, who lived in Los Angeles, was pronounced dead at the scene.
A more detailed report, which will include the trajectory of the bullets fired into Hunter, is expected in the coming weeks.
Meanwhile, the Los Angeles County District Attorney’s Office has assigned a two-person team to investigate the use of deadly force by the SMPD, a standard procedure in all officer-involved shootings.
“Our investigation is solely to determine whether the actions of the police officers involved were criminal,” said Sandi Gibbons, a spokesperson for the DA’s Office. “We are not here to say whether or not it was in policy or out of policy.”
Hunter was shot and killed about 12:30 a.m. Monday a few hundred yards away from Club Twenty Twenty, a popular dance club located on Wilshire Boulevard near 20th Street.
SMPD responded to a report of a fight inside the club. When officers arrived, they were approached by a club patron who said that Hunter had a gun. Officers tried to question Hunter, but he fled on foot, prompting the officers to chase him, said SMPD Lt. Frank Fabrega.
3E2,SMPD officials said a gun was recovered near Hunter’s body.
The DA’S team consists of a lawyer and an investigator who will conduct an independent investigation that will include a report of the incident by the SMPD, Gibbons said.
“We don’t finish ours until they give us their shoot book,” Gibbons said of the pending report.
The investigation is expected to take six weeks.
“If we find the shooting to be criminal and we feel we have the evidence to prove it, we will file a case. However, that would be very rare,” Gibbons said. “We don’t file a lot of those cases.”
Gibbons said it is very difficult to secure a conviction when an officer is charged.
“People trust the police because they are the ones enforcing the law,” she said. “They (police) are the ones who protect people and often they have to use force, and that force can escalate as the threat against them escalates. All that is weighed when we consider whether or not to file.”
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Originally published in the Santa Monica Daily Press print edition on September 7, 2006. Read the original PDF.