San Jose Police Identify Officer Who Killed Armed Suspect
SAN JOSE (KCBS) - San Jose police have identified the officer who shot an armed suspect to death Monday, but withheld the dead man's name to investigate a possible connection to an earlier shooting.
"There are potential witnesses that are possibly still out that we have not interviewed and so we want to make sure that we don't taint the investigation in any manner," said Officer Jose Garcia, spokesman for the San Jose Police Department.
The officer who pulled the trigger during the deadly confrontation near the Central County Occupational Center has been identified as 39-year-old Jeff Harwell, who's been on the force since 2006.
KCBS' Matt Bigler Reports:
Harwell's attorney told a newspaper the officer gave the suspect "every possible last second to surrender."
Garcia would not elaborate on the ink between the dead man and an earlier shooting in the nearby Communications Hill area where several rounds were fired into a parked car.
The suspect was wearing shorts and no shirt at the time he was killed, despite the overcast weather conditions. Garcia said it's too early to know whether that attire indicates anything about the suspect's state of mind before or during the confrontation.
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