- A white police officer fatally shot a black woman inside her own home on Saturday after they received a call about her open door, the Fort Worth Police Department said.
- Authorities released body-camera footage showing that the officer approached her window, shouted "put your hands up! Show me your hands!" and fired a shot immediately.
- The woman's neighbor who initially called police, James Smith, said he was shaken and angry with the way police responded to the incident.
- "If I had never dialed the police department, she'd still be alive," Smith told the Fort Worth Star-Telegram.
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A white Fort Worth police officer fatally shot a black woman inside her own home on Saturday after her neighbor called authorities for a welfare check when he spotted her front door was left open.
The officers arrived at 28-year-old Atatiana Jefferson's home around 2:25 a.m. on Saturday after receiving a call for an "open structure," according to a press release. While searching the home's perimeter, the officers spotted a person standing inside near a window, the release said.
"Perceiving a threat the officer drew his fury weapon and fired one shot striking the person inside the residence," the release said. "Officers entered the residence locating the individual and a firearm and began providing emergency medical care."
Jefferson was pronounced dead on the scene, according to the release.
The officer has been placed on administrative leave pending a police investigation, the press release said.
The neighbor who called police says he's shaken and angry by the way police officers responded
Already, Jefferson's death has sparked outrage within the Fort Worth community.
The neighbor who phoned police to report her open front door, James Smith, told the Fort Worth Star-Telegram that he had just been trying to be a good neighbor and had hoped police would check on Jefferson.
"I'm shaken. I'm mad. I'm upset. And I feel it's partly my fault," Smith said. "If I had never dialed the police department, she'd still be alive."
The Fort Worth Police Department immediately released body-cam footage showing the shooting.
This video shows scenes of the police shooting that some readers may find disturbing:
A police officer can be seen walking around the home, eventually approaching a window and abruptly shining his flashlight inside.
"Put your hands up! Show me your hands!" the officer yells, firing a shot immediately.
He cannot be heard in the video identifying himself as a police officer.
"It makes you not want to call the police department," Smith told the Star-Telegram. "If you don't feel safe with the police department, then who do you feel safe with? Do you just ignore crime or ignore something that's not right?"
- Read more:
- Former Dallas cop sentenced to 10 years in prison for shooting her unarmed black neighbor to death in his own apartment
- Mississippi police officers fatally shot a man in a wrong-door raid. The city says he had no constitutional rights because he was an undocumented immigrant.
- Pete Buttigieg says South Bend is a 'mess' after police shooting of a black man and that the police force isn't more racially diverse because he 'couldn't get it done'
- A Virginia city's first black, female police chief resigned, saying she encountered racism 'so inflammatory' that she feared describing it publicly 'out of concern for public safety'
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