The NYPD released body-worn camera footage Tuesday of a non-fatal police shooting in Maspeth earlier this year.
The footage shows a police officers firing several rounds from a department issued handgun — and several more from a taser — at a man who had a knife and was claiming to be experiencing paranoid delusions.
On Friday, Jan. 8, around 6:17 p.m., emergency dispatchers got a call from someone who said they needed medical and police assistance because a man, who was recently released from Elmhurst Hospital, was in possession of a knife and tearing up his basement.
“He’s saying that somebody is trying to get him and they’re in the pipes,” the caller said. “He’s destroying the basement and he’s looking for this person.”
Officers from the 104th Precinct, including Stephen Sheehan, Ryan McMahon, Steven Parsell and Liam Dale, arrived to the home, located near 64th Street and 55th Avenue, to find Luis Padilla, 41, upset and holding his head in his hands.
“I was fine at the hospital,” Padilla told the officers. “Then I got home and things just started changing. I don’t know what the f–k is going on.”
Padilla also told officers that he had purposely broken his phone because he thought it had been compromised and was emitting a high pitched noise.
“I think my phone was hacked,” he said to the officers. “With everything else going on, it makes it sound like I’m crazy.”
Another man in the basement, whose face and name are being withheld, told the officers that Padilla had used meth earlier in the day. Padilla then admits that he had used meth around 12 hours ago, but was no longer feeling the effects of the drugs.
When one of the officers mentioned to Padilla that they were going to bring him back to the hospital to be checked out, Padilla reached into the waistband of his pants and pulled out a knife, holding the blade down toward his feet.
“I’m not going back to the f–ing hospital,” he said while crying.
Almost immediately, Officer McMahon fired his taser twice at Padilla, hitting him and knocking him back toward a stairwell where Officer Dale was standing.
Video of the incident shows Officer Sheehan firing his gun twice at Padilla as he is falling onto his stomach. Padilla was hit both times in his back.
As the shots ring out, the second man in the basement can be heard yelling at the officers, begging them not to shoot.
“Don’t shoot him, don’t shoot him,” the man said. “No, no, please, he’s OK.”
Padilla was put into custody and taken back to Elmhurst Hospital where he was treated for his gunshot wounds and released.
The Maspeth man was charged with one count of criminal possession of a weapon in the fourth degree. The case is being prosecuted by the Queens district attorney’s office.
The body-worn camera footage can be seen below. Viewer discretion is strongly advised.
