A man was killed early Sunday morning in a police-involved shooting that ensued after a knife tussle at a Boston apartment.
The incident happened around 12:30 a.m. in a first floor apartment on Shawmut Avenue in the South End.
Police said they were called to the apartment by medical personnel who were responding to a radio call for an emotionally disturbed man in his 30s who was suffering from paranoia and schizophrenia.
Authorities said the man, who has not been identified, tried to attack the medical personnel with a knife.
When police arrived on the scene, the man tried to attack officers while they tried to de-escalate the situation. When police were unable to stop him, authorities said they had no other choice but to fire at the man.
The man was taken to an area hospital where he was pronounced dead.
The man's mother said he had a history of mental issues and that police should not have opened fire.
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Boston Police Commissioner William Evans said his officers had no choice.
"The mother is distraught. I don't think she was in the apartment when EMS were taking him out," Williams said. "I understand her grief. From everything I've heard, officers had to move in and save the two EMTs and it almost cost them their lives."
Suffolk County District Attorney Daniel F. Conley said a "thorough, impartial, independent investigation" would be conducted.
"As we have in every such case for more than a decade, we will release our entire investigative file to the family of the deceased and the media upon its conclusion," Conley said. "To my knowledge, this level of transparency in fatal police shootings is unparalleled, and no other district attorney's office in the country affirmatively releases every report, every interview, every dispatch transmission, and every map and diagram in every case as we do."
