Nevada Highway Patrol identifies officers who killed man
The Nevada Highway Patrol released a video statement Thursday that named two officers who fatally shot an unarmed man last weekend.
Highway Patrol Chief Anne Carpenter stood alone at a podium to detail the shooting four days after 41-year-old Adrian Zarate-Cervantes was killed.
Troopers Michael Abbate and Mark Willner, who shot Zarate-Cervantes after he stepped from a car along Lake Mead Boulevard, have been with the department since 2013, Carpenter said.
Zarate-Cervantes had called police at 7:22 a.m. Sunday to report that his wife claimed she was being kidnapped. Carpenter said that a woman, who was riding with Zarate-Cervantes, told police her husband had slapped her and would not allow her to get out of the car.
Troopers found the pair about an hour later in a gray Toyota Corolla driving on Lake Mead Boulevard, near Los Feliz Street.
In body camera and dashcam footage from the shooting, troopers could be heard telling Zarate-Cervantes to put his hands up multiple times.
Zarate-Cervantes was seen reaching toward his back pocket before he was shot once by Abbate. After momentarily clutching his chest and crouching, Zarante-Cervantes stood upright and reached for his back pocket and swung his right arm in the direction of officers before he was shot twice, once by each officer.
“The suspect stood up, made a motion that could not be mistaken for anything other that drawing a firearm and pointed it in the direction of trooper Abbate,” Carpenter said.
In the video, Carpenter spoke directly to a camera without reporters having been invited to attend the briefing or allowed to ask questions.
Abbate fired two rounds from his 9mm handgun. Willner fired one.
Zarate-Cervantes was unarmed, Carpenter said.
“Both troopers believed at the time of the incident that the suspect intended on killing them,” Carpenter said.
Las Vegas Justice Court records showed that he was found guilty of driving under the influence in a 2014 case and found guilty of reckless driving in a 2011 case. He was sentenced to DUI school in both cases.
The Metropolitan Police Department is expected to investigate the shooting, as is standard when Highway Patrol officers fire their weapons.
Contact Sabrina Schnur at sschnur@reviewjournal.com or 702-383-0278. Follow @sabrina_schnur on Twitter.
