Unarmed man shot by Fort Worth officer ignored warnings, tried to grab cop’s gun: police
An unarmed man who was shot by a Fort Worth police officer Sunday after officials said he robbed a 24-hour vape shop ignored the officer’s repeated commands to back up and tried to grab the cop’s gun, Chief Neil Noakes said in a video released by the police department on Friday.
Officers were dispatched to Vape City in the 6400 block of McCart Avenue in south Fort Worth regarding a robbery call around 4 a.m. Security-camera footage from Vape City shows a man enter the store with a crowbar and a large cardboard box. He immediately uses the crowbar to try to break glass on a display case and then moves around the store, dumping products into the box.
Police identified the suspect as 37-year-old Walker Cadd.
A vape shop employee called 911 to report the robbery, and told the dispatcher that the suspect was armed with a crowbar. The dispatcher asked if the suspect had any weapons other than the crowbar. “No, not that I could tell,” the employee said, according to 911 audio released by police.
The first officer arrived on the scene at 4:03 a.m., according to Noakes, and saw the suspect running through the creek bed behind the shopping center and heading toward a residential area.
Video from the officer’s body camera shows a figure running while the officer tracks him with a flashlight. The officer can be heard giving the suspect’s location on his radio.
“He’s heading towards behind Bank of America. Can somebody get over there quick?” the officer says.
Cadd then jumped a fence into the back yard of a house in the 3200 block of Fargo Court, Noakes said. The officer moved to that location after directing responding units to where the suspect was last seen. The officer found the suspect hiding in a storage shed in the back yard of a home.
Noakes said at a Friday press conference that officers usually have another officer with them when they go into situations like that, but according to the preliminary investigation, the officers were trying to respond as quickly as possible because they’d been told a robber was on the loose in a residential area.
Bodycam video shows the officer point his handgun toward the back of the shed, where Cadd was crouched down, and yell “Show me your hands!” Then the officer immediately gives his location to the other officers who hadn’t arrived yet.
The suspect can be heard saying “no” to the officer’s repeated commands to show his hands. Cadd then stands up and starts walking toward the officer, who threatens to shoot.
In the video, Cadd does not appear to have anything in his hands and at times has his hands raised.
“You’ll kill me?” Cadd asks as he advances. “Back up! Yes,” the officer says.
Cadd kept moving directly toward the officer, who pushed him back when he got within arm’s length and retreated from the shed, Noakes said.
The officer can be heard repeatedly yelling at Cadd to back up, but the suspect ignored him and finally reached the door of the shed, Noakes said.
Once outside the shed, the suspect started moving toward a large opening in the fence, according to Noakes.
“In an attempt to prevent Cadd’s escape, the officer reached for Cadd with his left hand to stop him,” Noakes said. “Cadd then turned toward the officer and reached toward the officer’s gun.”
The officer, afraid Cadd was trying to take his weapon, fired his gun twice, Noakes said. One of the shots struck the suspect in the leg.
In the video, Cadd can be seen falling to the ground by the fence and crying out. The officer continues to yell at the suspect to show his hands.
A backup officer arrived several seconds later and both officers secured the suspect and provided him with emergency medical care. Cadd was treated at a local hospital and released into police custody later that day, according to Noakes.
Noakes said at the press conference that officers are trained to “have the handgun there” instead of a Taser when they are in a situation when they don’t know what kind of a threat they are facing and when they have information the suspect may be armed.
“Had there been other officers available, maybe there were other options,” Noakes said. “But in that scenario, using a handgun was the correct choice to make, according to the training we provide.”
According to Noakes, police found out “after the fact” that Cadd didn’t have the crowbar on him at the time of his encounter with the officer. The officers who backtracked his path from the vape shop to the residence discovered he’d thrown the crowbar, but the officer who confronted him in the shed “was not aware of that,” the chief said. The suspect’s clothes were large and covered his waistline, so to the officer’s knowledge, it wasn’t a sure thing that he didn’t have another weapon on him, Noakes said.
“Officers are trained to not let anyone take their gun,” Noakes said. “Because what often happens in situations like that is they can turn deadly for that officer or another innocent resident who may be nearby.”
Cadd is currently being held in the Tarrant County Jail. He’s been charged with attempting to take a weapon from an officer and theft, according to court records.
The investigation into the shooting is ongoing. Police said Sunday that the officer who shot the man has been placed on leave and investigations are underway by the Fort Worth police major case unit, internal affairs and the Tarrant County Criminal District Attorney’s Office.
This story was originally published January 12, 2024 at 3:17 PM.
