Man is fatally shot by police near DTLA freeway ramp

A man was fatally shot by Los Angeles police officers near a downtown freeway ramp early Monday, the LAPD said.

Lt. Raul Jovel, an LAPD spokesman, said preliminary information from the scene indicated that Rampart Division officers had attempted to stop the man on foot in the area of West 7th and South Bixel streets about 3:50 a.m. when the man allegedly ran from them.

About a block away, at 8th and Bixel streets near an on-ramp for the 110 Freeway, Jovel alleged the man “produced a firearm” and was shot by the officers. He said the man was transported to a local hospital, where he was pronounced dead.

Jovel said he did not know why the officers had first attempted to stop the man. He did not identify the man, or the officers who were involved. Jovel said a firearm was recovered from the scene.

The incident is under investigation by the department’s Force Investigation Division, as is standard in police shootings, and officials were working Monday to identify and review any body-worn or surveillance video from the scene. The case will be reviewed by LAPD Chief Michel Moore, the department’s inspector general and the civilian Police Commission.

The shooting added to a startling string of LAPD shootings in the last two weeks, which activists from Black Lives Matter Los Angeles and other groups have cited in calling for Moore to be fired.

With Monday’s shooting, there have been seven LAPD shootings since March 16, with three men killed and three wounded. A member of LAPD’s SWAT team also was shot during one of the incidents, sustaining injuries to his chest and face that he is expected to survive.

Police have alleged that, in each of the shootings, the person they opened fire on was carrying a weapon, but they have not yet released footage from any of the incidents. Moore acknowledged the cluster of shootings was “striking” but said each of the shootings would be judged “on their own merit.”

In a shooting outside the Olympic police station last week, police alleged a man who had tried to enter the station’s locked doors was carrying a gun. In another, police said that a gunman in a home exchanged gunfire with officers — leaving the SWAT officer wounded — before being shot and killed himself.

They alleged officers shot another man as he was trying to attack someone in a home with knives; shot and killed a man who had thrown a hammer at officers and threatened them with another item “resembling an ice ax”; and shot a man who allegedly bailed from a vehicle after a traffic collision carrying a gun.

They also said an off-duty lieutenant fired on a vehicle after allegedly witnessing a passenger in the car shoot a man on the street.

Prior to the recent string of shootings, there had been four police shootings in 2021. Last year there were 27 LAPD shootings in total, compared with 26 the year prior — which marked a 30-year low. Police have said they are reviewing the recent spate of shootings carefully.