Video shows Sacramento deputies shoot, kill suspect moments after he ‘executes’ girlfriend
The Sacramento County Sheriff’s Office has released home surveillance video footage and 911 audio from an officer-involved shooting incident last month, when three deputies shot a man dead moments after he had gunned down his girlfriend outside a Carmichael apartment.
The incident began about 12:30 a.m. Oct. 27, after a car had crashed into a tree near the 5800 block of Angelina Avenue, the Sheriff’s Office said in news releases that day and on Wednesday.
Multiple 911 callers had reported that a man and woman were involved in a “verbal altercation” at the scene of the crash, and that the man was waving a gun in the air, according to the news releases.
Deputies arrived at the scene about 10 minutes later, and when they attempted to initiate contact, the man shot the woman. Three deputies then immediately opened fire on the male suspect, video shows.
Both the man, who has since been identified by the coroner’s office as Earnest Easterling, 25, and the woman, Chanell Brown, 23, were pronounced dead at the scene by fire personnel.
The Sheriff’s Office on Wednesday released surveillance footage taken from a residence on Angelina Avenue and audio from three 911 calls to the sheriff’s dispatch center.
The video, which includes commentary by sheriff’s spokeswoman Sgt. Tess Deterding, captures the violent and disturbing confrontation leading up to the fatal shootings.
As Deterding explains, “the suspect is seen pulling the victim – his girlfriend – towards an apartment, kicking an apartment door and physically assaulting the female victim while holding a gun in his left hand.”
Video then shows the man shoving the woman up against a wooden fence, still holding the gun, yelling, “You got the police called on me. I didn’t do s---.”
“When they come, I’m blasting you. ... You broke my car, doing that weird s---,” he says, attempting to strike her with his hand.
At one point, the suspect walks away from the apartment briefly, then returns with a larger-capacity magazine in his handgun.
“He had replaced the standard magazine in his handgun with a 50-round drum magazine,” Deterding says.
Deterding notes that the deputies had no knowledge of this part of the altercation, captured by private security cameras, at the time they arrived to the scene, a few minutes later.
Once the deputies got there, Deterding says, a female witness ran from the apartment toward them and directed their attention to the suspect and victim, who were near an apartment doorway at that point. The witness also “alerted deputies that the suspect had a gun,” Deterding says.
The deputies give instructions to the female victim to raise her hands, which she does, and they tell the suspect to leave the doorway, the video shows.
As the victim starts to move away from the apartment, the suspect rushes out from the doorway and toward her with the gun pointed at her. One shot can be seen being fired by the suspect at the victim before both of them disappear out of frame behind a fence. Fractions of a second later, bursts of about two dozen to three dozen more gunshots are heard, followed by screaming.
“As the female victim moved away from the apartment, the suspect emerged and opened fire on the female victim, executing her in front of the deputies,” Deterding says in the video’s commentary. “As the suspect emerged and began firing, all three deputies on scene fired their weapon at the male suspect immediately, attempting to stop him from killing the female victim.”
There is no video of the incident from deputies’ perspective, Deterding told The Sacramento Bee on Wednesday.
The Sheriff’s Office does not use body-worn cameras, and though sheriff’s vehicles are outfitted with dashboard cameras, Deterding said the vehicles’ dashcams may not have been activated at the time of the shooting. Even if they were, she said, the vehicles were located in such a way that the cameras would not have had a view of the shooting.
“The vehicles are facing north and the shooting happens pointing east,” Deterding said.
At the end of the video, Deterding says Easterling was arrested in Nevada in 2016 for crimes including possession a concealed firearm, possession of marijuana and possession of a gun with an altered serial number. But because he was not convicted on any gun-related charges, he was able to legally purchase the firearm used in the incident in 2017, she said.
The involved deputies were veterans of 4, 12 and 21 years with the agency, according to the earlier news release. They have been placed on paid administrative leave in accordance with its policy, the sheriff’s office said.
In 911 audio, witnesses report a car crashing into a tree and the altercation involving a firearm. When the dispatcher asks if anyone was injured, one of the callers responds, “I don’t know but there could be soon,” adding that a man was “waving a gun around” at a woman.
The video includes audio redactions removing the names and identifying information for the 911 callers and witnesses at the scene.
The investigation of the fatal incident remains active, according to Deterding.
This story was originally published November 6, 2019 at 12:24 PM.
