The Treasure Valley saw its seventh fatal shooting involving law enforcement on Thursday night — six of them in Ada County — when a man died at a local hospital after being shot by police in Star.
The 41-year-old will be identified by the Ada County Coroner’s Office, according to a press release on the Ada County Sheriff’s Office website. No one from the Star Police Department was injured. The city contracts its law enforcement services with the sheriff’s office.
The Star officer who shot the man was put on paid administrative leave, which is standard policy. The Garden City Police Department will lead the Critical Incident Task Force’s investigation into the shooting, the press release said.
The Star Police received a call from a third party saying the man was “making suicidal statements and threatening to harm himself,” the release said. They responded to a field along Idaho 16 south of Floating Feather Road and found him not long after 5:40 p.m.
Officers spoke to the man and said they could see him holding a gun, brandishing it and pointing it at his head, and asked him to drop the gun, the release said. Shortly after 6 p.m., police heard a shot and saw the man fall into the field.
Officers approached the man and, seeing him move his hands, ordered him to throw his gun aside so they could help safely, the release said. After about 10 minutes, the man sat up, yelled at the police and waved the gun again, and a Star police officer fired his weapon at the man.
The 41-year-old then sat back up and raised his hands, and paramedics began medical treatment after he was officially taken into custody at the scene, police said. At around 7 p.m., they took the man to a local hospital, where he died about two hours later, the release said.
Patrick Orr, spokesman for the Ada County Sheriff’s Office, said more exact details are still being determined and the case is being actively investigated, in addition to the independent CITF investigation which is taking place using police deadly force.
There have been a total of nine shootings involving law enforcement this year in Ada County, and one in Canyon County. That shooting in Nampa was fatal.
According to previous Idaho Statesman reports, the Boise Police Department is responsible for six of the shootings in Ada County, four of which were fatal. Sheriff’s office employees have been involved in the other two shootings in Ada.
According to a Statesman database, there will be at least 11 fatal police shootings in Idaho by 2023.
