Vest saved officer, Sacramento PD used robot to disarm wounded suspect, videos show
The Sacramento Police Department on Friday released video and shared new details about a Parkway shootout last month in which a man shot an officer, who then returned fire and wounded the suspect.
Police in the March 23 incident then used a bomb robot to move the gun away from the downed suspect, who authorities said continued to reach for the firearm.
The man, identified by authorities as 32-year-old Joshua Hippard, was transported to a hospital. He has since been released from the hospital and booked into the Sacramento County Jail, where he faces multiple charges including one for attempted murder.
The officer’s body armor vest likely saved him from serious injury or death, as he was shot one time in the chest, police said.
The incident started shortly before midnight in the 5900 block of Tangerine Avenue, where patrol officers responded to a 911 call reporting shots fired.
Police on Friday released body camera, surveillance and aerial video footage from the incident, as well as audio files.
The first two videos show a man approaching a police patrol vehicle as it drove up the street. Within seconds, the man opened fire into the police car.
The officer immediately exited his vehicle and fired back at the man, who was running away, and the suspect fell to the ground with the gun landing a short distance away from him.
The initial responding officer then took cover behind a different vehicle, and began ordering Hippard to crawl toward him if he was able to.
A second officer then arrived at the scene, shortly after a dispatcher could be heard through his radio advising that the gun was still in the suspect’s hand. This officer drew his weapon as he took cover near the first officer, and repeatedly ordered the suspect, laying prone at this point, to put down the gun or throw it away from his body.
Hippard didn’t immediately comply. His voice can be heard, but his words aren’t intelligible in the bodycam videos.
The Police Department said in a news release accompanying the videos that crisis teams and SWAT officers then arrived, negotiating for “several hours” with Hippard before taking him into custody without further incident.
Before taking him into custody, “Hippard refused to move away from his gun so members from the SPD Explosive Ordnance Disposal Unit used a specialty robot to move the loaded .45 caliber Glock pistol out of his reach,” the Police Department said in a news release.
The aerial video shows it took the robot about 10 minutes to move the pistol. During this time, the suspect, whose face is blurred in the video, moved his arm and head a few times but did not reach for the gun at this point, continuing to lay on the ground as blood is visible underneath him.
After the gun was removed, a group of about six SWAT officers approached Hippard and detained him.
The Sacramento Police Department tweeted around 4 a.m. on March 24 that both the suspect and officer involved in the incident were hospitalized and in stable condition.
According to Friday’s news release, one of the initial shots Hippard fired into the vehicle struck the unidentified officer in the chest and another hit the driver’s seat.
“We are fortunate that the officer’s body armor protected him from further serious injury,” Police Chief Daniel Hahn said in a prepared statement.
The department news release said further investigation revealed Hippard allegedly “fired his gun at an occupied moving vehicle in the area” prior to police arriving at the scene.
Jail logs show Hippard was booked the night of March 26 on felony charges of assault with a firearm, discharge of a firearm at an inhabited vehicle and attempted murder. He is ineligible for bail.
The Police Department says it is investigating the shooting incident internally, with oversight from the Office of Public Safety Accountability and the Sacramento County District Attorney’s Office.
This story was originally published April 2, 2021 at 11:18 AM.
