Bodycam Footage Shows Fatal Shooting Of Suspect Carrying Hatchet

The San Jose District Attorney's Office announced that they will not charge two San Jose police officers who were involved in a fatal officer-involved shooting at the Metcalf Energy Center in January. Around 5:00 p.m. on January 9, 2018,



Thompson Nguyen drove to the plant on Blanchard Road, climbed over a fence and began to stalk the campus, carrying a hatchet in one hand and a metal staff in the other. Authorities said he also had another hatchet, three pipes, seven knives, nunchucks, a GoPro camera, and a sword. According to the DA's Office, Officers Adam Hutson and Timothy Faye arrived soon after and tried to get Nguyen to drop his weapons. Nguyen told officers, "Shoot me!" and "Kill me!" numerous times. One officer replied, "We don't want to shoot."




Body cam footage released by the DA showed officers following Nguyen for several minutes and asked him nearly 30 times to stop before the shooting.



Officer's fired on Nguyen once he approached them with the hatchet and the metal staff and got within striking range. Authorities say Nguyen suffered from mental illness.



Prosecutor David Boyd said, "Any reasonable officer would conclude that Nguyen, whether as a result of a mental health issue or not, had decided that he was going to die that day and that if he had to attack an officer with a weapon to make it happen, he was going to do so."



Nguyen was pronounced dead at the scene. According to the DA's report, after the shooting, officers found a fake police badge and journals in Nguyen's car in which he wrote that Metcalf employees had put microchips in his brain.