Striker fired beats hammer in New Mexico

This footage,coming from Las Cruces, New Mexico, shows an officer called to address reports of a person threatening restaurant staff and customers while wielding a knife and hammer. When the officer makes contact, the suspect advances on him with the hammer despite repeated warnings. The hammer being a deadly weapon, the officer shoots and kills the suspect. Viewer discretion is advised. Phillip Mullen, 50 years of age, exits his car and advances aggressively toward the officer, hammer in-hand. The officer tells him to stop and not to raise the weapon no less than eight times. However, Mullen continues to advance while the officer backpedals to keep him from closing the distance between them. This retreating situation is untenable, and the officer is forced to shoot Mullen three times. From a tactical perspective, holstering and changing weapon systems could have provided the suspect a window or reactionary gap within which to attack. Although aid is rendered on-scene, the released video almost completely obfuscates it and as such, it is omitted from this cut for the sake of brevity. Mullen was pronounced dead on-scene.

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