Oakland police release video of fatal officer shooting of man swinging homemade spears
By Carlos E. Castañeda
The Oakland Police Department on Thursday released a compilation video of officer body camera footage of the fatal shooting last month of a man wielding two homemade spear-like devices at officers.
The incident happened at 2:12 p.m. on July 13 in a strip mall parking lot at 40th and International Boulevard in the Fruitvale neighborhood of East Oakland. The compilation video, which includes body cam footage from CHP and Oakland police officers as well as surveillance footage, can be found here. (Warning: footage includes graphic images and language.)
Minutes earlier, officers had responded to a call from California Highway Patrol officers who had encountered a man at a homeless encampment along State Route 185 next to 42nd Avenue and south of San Leandro Street. CHP bodycam video showed the man, identified as 43-year-old Jose Castillo, refusing an officer’s command for him to drop his weapons, which were two large knives each attached to long poles.
“You’re detained right now,” the officer says. “You need to drop those right now.”
The man instead held up the makeshift spears and verbally threatened the CHP officers, prompting the other officer to point his service weapon at Castillo, who then walked away toward SR 185. Oakland police officers then found him in the area of 12th Street and 41st Avenue, and he continued to refuse multiple commands to drop the weapons while threatening officers and quickly walking away from them.
At one point, the video shows a bystander and two young children crouching behind a tree on the sidewalk on 41st Avenue as Castillo walked toward them just before an officer holding a stun gun blocked his path. Other officers also converged at the location along 41st Avenue to follow him as he kept refusing commands to drop the weapons.
“I don’t have to do nothing,” Castillo is heard saying. “Leave me alone! I’m leaving!”
As he approached International Boulevard, Castillo walked into a strip mall parking lot and then turned around to face the officers, at least two of whom shot him with their stun guns.
The video shows Castillo temporarily becoming disabled, but he then takes off the backpack and begins swinging the spears at the officers, who opened fire on him multiple times from about 15 to 20 feet away.
Castillo was pronounced dead at the scene. Police said investigators were seeking the public’s help in finding his next of kin.
On the day of the shooting, Oakland Police Chief James Beere said two officers discharged their firearms. The officers were not identified.
Police said as per protocol, the shooting will be investigated separately by the department’s internal affairs unit and the Alameda County District Attorney’s Office. The city’s Community Police Review Agency is also investigating the shooting.
