{"id":732,"date":"2018-03-23T21:03:27","date_gmt":"2018-03-24T01:03:27","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.gopplaybook.com\/?p=732"},"modified":"2018-03-23T21:03:27","modified_gmt":"2018-03-24T01:03:27","slug":"sacramento-man-fatally-shot-by-the-police-in-his-backyard","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.gopplaybook.com\/?p=732","title":{"rendered":"Sacramento Man Fatally Shot by the Police in His Backyard"},"content":{"rendered":"
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By\u00a0CHRISTINE HAUSER<\/span><\/a>

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Sequita Thompson, grandmother of Stephon Clark, surrounded by family members as they prayed on Monday afternoon. Mr. Clark was fatally shot by the Sacramento police on Sunday.<\/span>Credit<\/span>Jos\u00e9 Luis Villegas\/The Sacramento Bee<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

The police in Sacramento, searching for someone reported to have been breaking windows, fatally shot a young black man in his backyard over the weekend after he walked toward them carrying what they believed was a gun.<\/p>\n

When they examined his body, however, the only object they found was a cellphone.<\/p>\n

That was the account that the Sacramento Police Department offered on Tuesday\u00a0in an update<\/a>\u00a0to their investigation into the shooting by officers of the unarmed man, 22-year-old Stephon Clark, on Sunday.<\/p>\n

Mr. Clark\u2019s relatives, whom he lived with in the South Sacramento neighborhood, could not immediately be reached on Wednesday. But one of them told\u00a0The Sacramento Bee<\/a>\u00a0that family members often entered the home through the garage, after knocking on the back window because the doorbell was broken.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe only thing that I heard was pow, pow, pow, pow, and I got to the ground,\u201d said Sequita Thompson, Mr. Clark\u2019s grandmother, adding, \u201cI opened that curtain and he was dead.\u201d<\/p>\n

Mr. Clark\u2019s brother, Stevante,\u00a0told The Bee<\/a>\u00a0that Mr. Clark, who has two children, ages 1 and 3, had been living at the house for about a month, after being released from county jail.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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\u201cThey\u2019re asking, \u2018Where\u2019s Daddy, where\u2019s Daddy?\u2019\u201d said Salena Manni, the mother of Mr. Clark\u2019s children, according to the newspaper. \u201cHe was a part of our family. He was our rock.\u201d<\/p>\n

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Stephon Clark<\/span>Credit<\/span>Renee C. Byer\/The Sacramento Bee<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

The police said that footage from the law enforcement officers\u2019 body cameras and video from a sheriff\u2019s helicopter would be released to the public within 30 days.<\/p>\n

On Sunday, at 9:18 p.m., officers from the Sacramento Police Department arrived at a house on 29th Street, investigating reports that someone was breaking the windows of vehicles,\u00a0a separate, earlier police statement<\/a>said on Monday. The person who called the police said the suspect was wearing a black hoodie and dark pants and was \u201chiding in a backyard.\u201d<\/p>\n

Officers in a Sheriff\u2019s Department helicopter overhead informed the police that they saw someone matching that description and helped to direct the police to him, saying he had just \u201cpicked up a toolbar and broke a window to a residence.\u201d He was then seen running to the front of a house, the statement said.<\/p>\n