![]() The posters reached back nearly a decade, to the death of Mexican immigrant Ismael Mena, shot by SWAT officers in a botched drug raid. Or the kitchen knife that Paul Childs had in his hand when the mentally disabled teen was shot and killed by cops the year before. When news broke that Gomez had been pronounced dead at Denver Health, readers began leaving online comments comparing Gomez's lighter to the soda can that Frank Lobato reportedly was holding when he was shot and killed in his home by a Denver officer in 2004. And the image of a dying, unarmed man, a minority shot by a cop, can rip open a city's carefully patched-together image. Near his left hand, they spotted a white Bic lighter with a silver rim.Ī lighter on the pavement where there should have been a gun - that sight can make even the most hard-boiled law-and-order types queasy. Gomez, hit in the shoulder, stomach and legs, mortally wounded. When paramedics arrived just after 2:15 a.m., they found 33-year-old Jason T. He fired two rounds, paused, then fired four more. Campbell saw the glint of something metallic. The man reached into his pants pocket, put his hand behind his back, then started moving his hand forward. Campbell had his service pistol drawn: a. By now Campbell had closed the gap, and when the man got up again, the two were facing each other, less than ten feet apart. He got up and continued down the street, falling twice more. The man reached the 3200 block of West Ada Place, where he slipped on a patch of ice. Campbell followed him on foot, through back yards and over fences. As the officer drove up, a man - he looked to be in his early thirties, Hispanic, wearing a light, baggy jacket - jumped out of the car and ran. When Campbell made a U-turn, the Saturn quickly sped down a side street and pulled into a driveway. The patrolman had been driving north on Irving Street when he'd passed a 1997 Saturn that seemed suspicious. on December 19, Denver police officer Timothy Campbell was standing in the middle of the street in a west Denver neighborhood, his gun pointed at a man. Was the shooting justified? Read some of the excerpts from the story by clicking "More." Click here for a slideshow of other police-involved shootings in Denver. The story also looked into the circumstances behind Gomez’s death and the ultimate decision of the Denver District Attorney’s office to not file charges against the shooter, officer Timothy Campbell. The possibility of a lawsuit was first revealed by Westword in the April cover story " Target Practice," which examines the role of racial bias in police shootings. Last week, Gomez’s family filed a $5 million lawsuit against the city. It turned out that the only thing in the 33-year-old’s hand was a plastic lighter. Gomez was shot and killed last December after officials say he pulled what looked like a gun on a Denver Police Officer. Jason Gomez was shot and killed during an altercation with a Denver officer in December.
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