Newark police release body camera video of carjacking suspect's shooting death
NEWARK – Body camera videos were made public Friday showing Newark and Fremont police shooting a 19-year-old suspected in a carjacking last month.
The shooting took place in Newark on April 13, killing the car's driver, Elmer Lopez-Castaneda of Newark, police said.
The seven-and-a-half-minute video [warning: clip is graphic] includes surveillance camera footage from Feb. 14, when Newark police received a 911 call of a carjacking at knifepoint in the 5700 block of Thornton Avenue.
On April 13, a license plate recognition camera picked up the car on Mowry Avenue, police said.
The car was later found backed into a parking spot in the 39000 block of Cedar Boulevard with no one inside, according to the video.
Police put the car under surveillance and asked for assistance from the Southern Alameda County Major Crimes Task Force. A Newark detective and four members of the Fremont Police Department responded, along with other officers from both departments.
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The video picks up after officers see two men enter the stolen vehicle. The occupants are ordered to put up their hands and initially comply, according to the video.
The driver is directed to step out of the car with his hands in the air. Police tell him to turn around. As he does, an officer shouts, "Gun! Gun!" Others order the teen to drop to the ground.
The video appears to show the teen's left hand move to his waistband. Several officers fire.
The gun -- later identified as a full metal airsoft replica of a Beretta M9 pistol -- falls to the hood of the car, then to the ground.
"The sequence of events unfolds in approximately two seconds," according to the video.
The video can be found on the Newark Police Department's website under the Professional Standards page: www.newark.org/NPDProfessionalStandards.
The California Department of Justice is independently reviewing the shooting.
