An Iowa City Police Department officer shot a person on Monday morning while responding to a report about an armed and potentially suicidal individual.
“At 8:41 a.m., Monday, July 15, 2024, Iowa City Police Officers responded to the 1100 block of Wylde Green Road for a report of an armed suicidal subject,” the department said in a news release. “During the incident, an Iowa City Police Officer discharged their firearm. One subject was wounded and is currently hospitalized.”
The Iowa Division of Criminal Investigation (DCI) is investigating the shooting. ICPD automatically turns over investigations of officer-involved shootings to DCI, as a matter of department policy. The results of the DCI investigation will be sent to the Johnson County Attorney’s Office. The county attorney is responsible for deciding if the shooting was justified.
“The officer will remain on paid administrative leave during the duration of the investigation,” ICPD said.
This is the first time in five years an ICPD officer has shot someone. In July 2019, an officer shot a shoplifting suspect, after the suspect shot the officer multiple times with a BB gun. Two months before that incident, two ICPD officers fired their weapons at a burglary suspect who was driving a truck and trying to ram them. The suspect was struck by one bullet.
In both of those cases, the wounded suspects were briefly hospitalized for their injuries. The DCI investigated both cases. Then-Johnson County Attorney Janet Lyness found both shootings justified.
Prior to May 2019, the last time an ICPD officer discharged a weapon in the line of duty was in December 2011, while performing a wellness check on a person whose relatives had reported him as at risk for committing suicide.
When officers arrived at the person’s home on Summit Street, they discovered he had a gun tucked into his waistband. According to the report on the incident, the officers attempted to persuade the person to go to the hospital, but fired at him when he reached for the gun.
“One officer deployed less lethal bean bag rounds at the man and another officer deployed a Taser at him. A third officer fired a handgun at the man and stopped the man from obtaining his gun,” ICPD said in a press release at the time.
The injured person was hospitalized, and recovered. County Attorney Lyness ruled the shooting was justified.
The only other ICPD shooting incident in recent years happened in November 2014, when an officer cleaning his gun accidentally shot himself and another officer standing nearby. Both officers were treated for “non-life-threatening” injuries at University of Iowa Hospitals and Clinics, according to a departmental press release about the incident.
In its news release about Monday’s shooting, ICPD said, “No other information will be released until the investigation has been completed.”
