Videos show Anthony McClain is shot while running from Pasadena police; they say he had a gun

Videos of the Saturday police shooting of Anthony McClain showed a Pasadena police officer fire at least two shots at a fleeing McClain, who held what police say was a firearm, though the family’s lawyer has contested that description.

Pasadena police on Thursday released the bodycam footage along with video from the dashboard camera on the patrol car and surveillance video from a business. The officer who shot McClain did not have his camera turned on until after the shooting. The only bodycam video from the shooting was taken by his partner on the scene, who did not shoot McClain. Police also released photographs of a handgun recovered at the scene.

McClain, 32, of Pasadena, was shot about 8 p.m. near Raymond Avenue and Grandview Street after two Pasadena police officers pulled over a car in which McClain was a passenger. McClain died from a gunshot wound to the torso, according to the coroner’s office. He was pronounced dead at Huntington Hospital in Pasadena at 9:46 p.m. on Saturday. The autopsy report has not been completed and released.

Police showed McClain’s family an edited 8-minute video with police department narration before releasing the edited video and the raw footage to the media and public.

“We saw an edited version, a heavily edited version of the video from Pasadena PD. It’s clearly the propaganda they want to forward in the media to you,” said Caree Harper, an attorney representing McClain’s family after stepping out of the Pasadena Police Department on Thursday. She also was given a flash drive with the full unedited video.

“The video that I saw stops just before the shot was fired, and the officer in my opinion did not need to shoot at all,” she said. “And it’s arguable what, if anything, might have been on Mr. McClain at the time. You will not see a literal smoking gun.”

The shooting took place about one minute and 40 seconds after two police officers pulled over a car for an alleged traffic violation. The video shows the driver admitting to driving without a driver’s license during the stop and is asked to step out of the car. Officers also ask the car’s passenger, identified as McClain, to step out of the car.

As he exits the car, McClain begins to sprint from the officers, leaving his shoes in the street behind him. An edited, slowed down video of police dashcam footage shows McClain gripping his waistband where a shiny object is seen.

One officer, with a gun drawn, is running toward McClain, who is dashing diagonally across Raymond Avenue. McClain turns his head back over his right shoulder toward the officer. It is at this point where police say in the edited video McClain was holding an object in his left hand.

After McClain turns forward, away from the officer, continuing to sprint, the officer is heard yelling, “Stop right now,” then two gunshots are heard in the video.

The video shows the officer pointing his gun at McClain and toward several houses in Raymond Avenue as the shots in the video are heard.

After the gunshots are heard, McClain continues to sprint down the street.

Police claim in the edited video’s narration that the object McClain held in his waistband and later, in his left hand, was a gun.

The edited video pieces together footage of a nearby surveillance camera, which police say shows McClain throw a firearm across Raymond Avenue.

Harper said the shiny object seen in the video is not a gun but is actually a belt buckle.

“The video that they’re going to release to you saying it’s a weapon, we’re going to assert it’s his MK belt buckle,” Harper said, adding that he was seen wearing the buckle the day he was shot.

In bodycam footage from a third officer who arrived after the shooting and assisted with treating McClain’s wounds, a large metal “MK” belt buckle could be seen on his waist as he lay on the grass.

Police say they recovered a handgun along Raymond avenue after the shooting. In the edited video, police said the gun was illegally assembled from parts of various other guns.

McClain died from at least one gunshot wound at Huntington Hospital in Pasadena at 9:46 p.m.

Officers saw McClain holding a gun while running away, Police Chief John Perez said in an earlier interview. He said McClain began to turn when the officer shot him, as the officer feared McClain was going to take aim and shoot. He was still running when he tossed the gun aside, ran for about 20 yards, then collapsed, Perez said.

Based on the videos alone, it is not immediately clear that McClain threw the weapon — something police spokesman Lt. Bill Grisafe acknowledged in an earlier interview.

The idea that McClain threw the weapon didn’t come from police officers, but a witness on the scene, Perez said on Thursday.

However, Harper said she’s found witnesses who claimed “he did not turn towards officers with a gun. We have other witnesses who say he was running, merely trying” to get away. “And everyone will recognize that fleeing felons — even if he was a felon, which they had no way of knowing — you can’t go shooting people in the back.”

When asked if he thought the shooting was justified, Perez said the officer “made the decision he had to make, and it was justified, but it’s way too early” to say with absolute certainty given the pending investigations.

It was a call the officer had to make in the moment, he said.

“There’s no reset for Mr. McClain; there’s no reset for the police officer who had to make this decision,” Perez said, arguing that if the officer hadn’t made the decision, he could be dead now instead of McClain.

When asked about the officer who shot McClain, and why his body camera wasn’t turned on at the time of the shooting, Perez said it was still under investigation. It’s not clear if the officer tried to turn it on and the device malfunctioned, or if he failed to even attempt to activate it, he said.

Still, the officer eventually turns on his camera after McClain has been shot.

The video begins with McClain lying on the grass with his hands in the air — blood spreading across his white shirt in the lower right of his back, as well as a smaller pool on his chest; Grisafe said those were from the bullet’s entry and exit wounds, respectively. 

As the officer looked down to administer aid, Grisafe said, he noticed the light on his camera wasn’t on, indicating it wasn’t recording. At that point, he activated it.

There’s no audio for the first 30 seconds of the video, as the audio only starts recording once the officer activates the camera, Grisafe said. Still, it retains 30 seconds of video before the camera is activated.

An agitated crowd was already gathering when officers were cuffing the bloodied McClain and beginning to administer aid. They would stay there through Saturday evening, leading to an incident where officers sprayed a chemical irritant into a crowd later that night and hit one man with a stun gun.

Since then, McClain’s family, friends and activists with Black Lives Matter Pasadena have continued to take to Pasadena streets in protest, demanding release of the footage.

Responding to demands, Pasadena police Chief John Perez pledged on Monday to release footage of the shooting later in the week, a swift move that is uncommon in most police use-of-force cases. State law requires police agencies to release footage of a deadly use-of-force incident within 45 days.

There are four simultaneous investigations into McClain’s shooting death. The Pasadena police homicide detectives are conducting a criminal investigation, the Los Angeles County District Attorney’s Office is investigating the possible criminality of the shooting, as they do with all officer-involved shootings in the county, Pasadena police officials are also investigating whether officers violated any department policies, and city officials also pledged to have a third party complete an independent investigation of the shooting.

A new police use-of-force bill, signed into state law in August 2019, specifies that an officer cannot use lethal force unless it is “necessary” to defend against an imminent threat of death or serious injury against an officer or other person, doing away with the old standard that allowed officers to kill if they have “reasonable fear.”

Jerry Steering, an attorney who sues police officers and departments in police misconduct cases and reviewed video of McClain’s shooting for this story, said the Pasadena police officer’s decision to shoot McClain was not necessary.

“No they shouldn’t have shot him,” Steering said. “Why? For what? Who’s he gonna’ kill? … Just cuz the guy is gonna get away doesn’t mean you gotta kill him.”

McClain never clearly directed the gun at officers but was hiding it from them, Steering said, trying to conceal it while running.

During protests throughout the week, activists have said McClain’s death is the latest example of police violence toward Pasadena’s Black residents in a city they say remains racially and economically unequal and divided.

Some members of the city’s Black community are still healing from other fatal police encounters where Black men were killed, such as the in-custody death of Reginald Thomas in 2016 and the killing of 19-year-old Kendrec McDade, who was shot seven times by Pasadena police officers in 2012.