CNN
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Three San Antonio police officers were charged with murder Friday, less than 24 hours after they shot a woman during a police call, the police chief announced.
Officer Eleazar Alejandro, 28; Sgt. Alfred Flores, 45; and Officer Nathaniel Villalobos, 27, are suspended from the force without pay as the investigation continues.
“The actions of the shooting officers were not consistent with SAPD policies and training and placed them in a situation where they used lethal force that was not reasonable given all the circumstances as we now understand them,” said the chief William McManus in a press conference. friday night
McManus said police were responding to a call that a woman, later identified as Melissa Ann Perez, 46, was cutting the wires to a fire alarm system in her apartment complex.
“It appears Ms. Perez was having a mental health crisis,” the chief said.
After initially speaking with officers outside, Perez returned to her apartment and locked the door, according to McManus.
The edited and blurred body camera video released by the police department shows officers continuing to talk to Perez through a rear window, urging her to get out.
In the body camera video, she can be heard saying twice, “You have no warrant!” An officer tried to open the window, and McManus said Perez threw a glass holder at him. Police said he later threw a hammer at an officer, but it hit the window, breaking it.
According to McManus, an officer opened fire, but Perez was not hit and can still be heard talking on the body camera footage.
But seconds later, McManus said, Perez “again advanced toward the window while still holding the hammer and all three officers opened fire.”
Over a dozen gunshots can be heard on the body camera footage. Perez was hit at least twice, according to McManus. Officers “attempted lifesaving measures,” the arrest warrant said, but Perez died at the scene.
Although she was allegedly approaching the officers with a hammer when the officers opened fire, the arrest warrant said Perez “was not an imminent threat of serious bodily injury or death when she was shot because the defendants had a wall, a window blocked by a television and a locked door between them.”
CNN requested the unedited body camera videos in the case.
Bexar County Jail records show all three officers were released on $100,000 bond. The police department will conduct an internal review and turn it over to prosecutors once it’s complete. Court records show their preliminary hearing is set for July 25.
CNN left messages with Alejandro and Villalobos seeking comment Saturday. CNN could not find contact information for Flores.
CNN reached out to the San Antonio Police Officers Association for comment Saturday and to determine if the officers have attorneys, but did not hear back.
The New York Times reported that it obtained a statement from the association saying, “At this time, this is an active investigation and cannot be discussed further until the investigation is complete and the legal process is ongoing.”
The statement added that the association offered its “deepest condolences to the family of Melissa Perez.”