What started as an attempt to arrest a man inside a gas station at 63rd Street and Prospect Avenue early Thursday evening left a Kansas City police officer in the hospital with a wound to his leg and a civilian dead.
The Missouri Highway Patrol is investigating the shooting, part of a process enacted after ongoing criticism of the Kansas City Police Department over cases where officers injured or killed civilians.
The officer was listed in stable condition Thursday night after being taken a few blocks from the gas station to Research Medical Center.
The incident started shortly before 6 p.m. Thursday. Police at the BP gas station saw a man they identified as being wanted in connection with an aggravated assault case, MHP Sgt. Andy Bell told reporters near the scene.
He said two officers went into the gas station.
“A fight, a struggle, ensued,” he said. Bell said two more officers came in to help with the arrest and “at some point the suspect … fired into the officer.”
Bell said an “officer, in self-defense, returned fire, striking the suspect.”
The man was declared dead shortly afterward at Research Medical Center. Bell said he believed the aggravated assault case that prompted the officers to attempt the arrest was a shooting.
Police did not publicly identify the man who was killed Thursday. Bell said the MHP investigation of the shooting was ongoing and the scene was being combed for evidence Thursday night.
