Close-up video shows Kevin E. Peterson Jr. fired on while running from deputies

Kevin Peterson Jr. is shown at a family wedding wearing a tuxedo.

The 21-year-old died in a police encounter on Oct. 29 near Vancouver.

Kevin E. Peterson Jr. appears to have been running from Clark County sheriff’s deputies at the time he was shot, according to a magnified version of a surveillance video released Friday.

The video was taken from a business across the busy highway from the U.S. Bank branch where Peterson was killed Oct. 29. Peterson, 21, can be seen at first walking south along the far side of the parking lot. Two cars driven by deputies pull into the lot and a third car that had been waiting at the entrance of the lot backs into area.

The video shows three deputies getting out of their cars. Peterson, who by then had made it to the corner of the lot, turns and runs north.

The deputies move toward Peterson, who runs away from them in the direction of the drive-through bank window. The video shows Peterson go down. An earlier version of the video was released but it did not include a close-up view of the shooting.

In all, the deputies fired a total of 34 times in what they described for investigators as a confusing scene that unfolded in seconds. The situation was so chaotic with so much gunfire that two of the deputies mistakenly feared that Peterson had fired at them. Peterson was hit four times and died on the pavement.

The 21-year-old Camas man had fled from his car in the parking lot of a Quality Inn and ran to the nearby parking lot of the closed U.S. Bank in the business district. He was armed with a .40-caliber Glock 23 semiautomatic handgun, which police say he pointed at them. He did not fire it. The video is too far away and blurry to see the deputies point their guns at Peterson or Peterson point his gun at them.

The deputies said Peterson appeared to be using his cellphone to record the incident, refused to drop his gun and ignored multiple commands.

“He absolutely did not ever ... surrender, put his hands up, comply with any orders that were being given,” Clark County Sheriff’s Sgt. Bill Sofianos told investigators. Sofianos was among the officers who were at the scene that day. “It was very, very obvious that it was an extremely dangerous situation.”

Kevin Peterson’s father said the video shows his son’s back to police.

“But they shot him anyway,” Kevin Peterson said in a statement released by his lawyers. “They chased him down, trapped him, and killed him.”

Lara Hermann, a lawyer for Peterson’s family and his partner, said the video shows Peterson “wasn’t a threat when he was shot.”

Clark County Prosecuting Attorney Tony Golik released the footage and 576 pages of documents, as well as photographs and audio files in the investigation of the fatal police encounter in Hazel Dell, an unincorporated Clark County community northwest of Vancouver.

It is the second release of records in the investigation. Last week, the office disclosed nearly 500 pages of material in the case.

The documents were released in response to a public records request from The Oregonian/OregonLive and other media organizations.

Golik has asked the Pierce County Prosecutor’s Office to review the case.

The encounter started as an undercover drug sting targeting Peterson. Members of a regional drug task force planned to arrest Peterson on an accusation of attempted delivery of controlled substances for allegedly dealing Xanax, the prescription anxiety medication, investigators said.

Vancouver police Officer Rodrigo Osorio estimated that the deputies who fired on Peterson were 25 to 40 yards away.

The first person to fire was 13-year Sheriff’s Office Detective Robert Anderson. Anderson told investigators that he reached a point during the encounter where he decided he had to shoot Peterson because Peterson was ignoring his commands.

In his interview with investigators, Anderson said when he pulled into the bank parking lot, Peterson was walking fast and holding a phone. He said it appeared Peterson was recording him with his phone.

Peterson was walking south, according to a transcript of Anderson’s interview. Anderson said he did not see a gun on Peterson, though he knew Peterson was armed.

With his gun drawn and aimed at Peterson, Anderson said he began to walk toward Peterson and ordered him to show his hands.

He said as Peterson approached the southeast corner of the lot, he reached into his sweatshirt and pulled out a gun. Anderson said he realized Peterson did not plan to give up.

“He’s gonna shoot it out with us, no doubt in my mind,” Anderson said.

He said he did not see what Peterson had done with the phone.

He said Peterson turned and headed north, where other Sheriff’s Office deputies had gathered to help contain the situation. Anderson said he feared Peterson is “gonna shoot one of ‘em in the face. I know it’s gonna happen.”

He said he continued to give commands as Detective Jeremy Brown pulled into the lot.

He said he decided he would shoot Peterson if Peterson continued to run and ignore his commands.

“At that point, I kinda just drew the line in the sand and I was – I said, ‘I’ve given suspect enough commands. If he takes another step, I’m gonna shoot him.’”

Peterson, he said, continued to run so he shot him.

He estimated that 30 to 40 seconds passed between the moment he stepped out of his Toyota 4Runner and when he decided to shoot Peterson.

“I started shooting, I recall hearing other shots go off,” Anderson said.

He said he fired and missed multiple times. He said Peterson was still running away.

“Just at about the time that I’m saying to myself and I’m thinking I’ve gotta bring myself together here, I see suspect go down,” Anderson said. “So I stop shooting.”

Then he said he saw Peterson sit up and aim his gun in the direction of Brown. He heard “a pop” and thought Peterson had fired on Brown.

“So I opened fire again,” he said. “At that point, I shot suspect until he went flat on his back, gun out of hand.”

Brown said Anderson and a patrol SUV came “bombing into the parking lot” as he sat in his truck at the entrance to the lot.

He said he put his truck into reverse and jumped out. He said he heard Anderson yelling, “Drop the gun!” repeatedly to Peterson. Meanwhile, Peterson was holding his phone and appeared to be recording or livestreaming the confrontation, Brown said.

Brown, a 14-year veteran of the Sheriff’s Office, said he heard shots but wasn’t sure he had a reason to fire.

“I’m still not seeing why I should be shooting,’ he said.

“I remember hearing the shots but the suspect did not look like they were affecting him at all,” he told investigators. “I’m thinking, uh, ‘Well, whoever’s shooting is missing.’”

He said Peterson then pointed his gun at him.

“I’m thinking I’m about to take rounds,” Brown said.

He heard shots coming from the north and south and thought he had been hit. He said he worried the adrenaline had masked the injury.

“I’m in a life-or-death moment right now,” he said he thought. So he fired his gun five or six times “very rapidly,” he said.

He said Peterson fell to his back.

Brown said he told Peterson to put his hands up. He said Peterson complied as he lay on the pavement. Then his hands went back to the ground.

The third deputy to fire was Jonathan Feller, who has been with Clark County Sheriff’s Office for nearly three years.

He said he saw Peterson with a gun when he pulled into the lot. He said he got out of his SUV, drew his handgun and told Peterson to drop the gun and get on the ground.

Seconds passed, he said, between the moment he got out of his SUV and fired his gun.

He said Peterson pointed his gun at him and at the same time Feller heard gunshots to his left “and I thought that he was shooting at me.”

Feller said he then fired at Peterson.

“All I knew is I had to stop him at that time because I believed he was firing at me,” he said. He said he thought he could not let Peterson “leave that situation. He had to be stopped.”

He said Peterson continued to move northbound. Feller said he aimed at Peterson’s “center mass.”

“Center mass turned into his left side which then … turned into his left side and his back because he was walking as I was following, shooting, staying where I was at,” he said.

He said Peterson made it several feet further and “sat down” near the entrance to the bank drive-thru entrance.

He said he then saw Peterson lay on his back.

The autopsy found that Peterson had been shot four times: once in his shoulder, twice in his chest and once in his arm.

After the shooting, a search of Peterson’s car turned up oxycodone and Xanax that investigators said appeared to be repackaged for sale.

Clark County Sheriff’s Office Deputy Jeremy Fields told investigators that the drug task force used a confidential informant to help arrange the undercover deal with Peterson. Fields said the informant has worked with other detectives in the unit.

He told the investigators that dealers advertise on Snapchat and the informant has “befriended several of them.” He said the informant is paid to help the police.

Sofianos, the Clark County sergeant, told investigators that the informant reached out to police to help bust drug dealers.

“He doesn’t like drug dealers sellin’ drugs in the community,” Sofianos told investigators, according to the transcript of his interview.

The sergeant told investigators that “Snapchat drug dealing has become a very big deal.”

He said the task force had worked on nearly two dozen Snapchat-related investigations recently and that Peterson was a new and unknown target.

“We’ve taken a plethora of drugs off of these … Snapchat dealers,” he said. “Our goal was to see if this individual was really gonna follow through with bringing drugs for sale.”

He said the plan was to “contact him, continue the investigation.”

“When we attempted to contact him, you know, he ran with a gun,” he said.

Peterson’s death touched off several tense demonstrations in Vancouver decrying the killing of a Black man by police in the wake of demands for social justice reforms nationwide after George Floyd died under the knee of a Minneapolis police officer in May.

-- Noelle Crombie; ncrombie@oregonian.com; 503-276-7184; @noellecrombie

If you purchase a product or register for an account through a link on our site, we may receive compensation. By using this site, you consent to our User Agreement and agree that your clicks, interactions, and personal information may be collected, recorded, and/or stored by us and social media and other third-party partners in accordance with our Privacy Policy.