Greeley Officer Involved, as paged

[jimmnn]

GREELEY - Police are investigating a deadly officer-involved shooting which occurred inside a hotel on Saturday.

The incident happened around 5 p.m. Saturday at the Ram-Kota Inn Best Western Hotel near 8th Street and 7th Avenue.

Police say they went to the hotel to check on a man who they were told was suicidal.

When they got to his room the man approached them with a knife. Officers asked the man to put it down, but they say he kept walking toward them.

That's when at least one officer opened fire, killing the man.

A girls’ volleyball tournament was taking place in Greeley this weekend and many players and their families were staying at the hotel.

Most of the girls were at the tournament when the shooting happened.

A 13-year-old boy was in the room right next door when the shots rang out, and he called his dad.

“I heard gunshots go off and I just started freaking out because I thought it was two people arguing,” said the 13-year-old boy. “I didn’t know there was a cop outside at the time.”

The boy’s father, Tim McKiernan was at the volleyball tournament when he got the call from his son.

“He said, ‘I heard gunshots.’ So I just kept him on the phone and came over here and kept him on the phone the whole time,” said McKiernan.

Police did not immediately release the name of the man who died, or the officers’ names.

 

[cstockmyer]

Sad..suicide by cop.

 

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And people visiting look at me funny when I say Welcome to the Greeley Jungle.

From the Greeley Trib:

Man shot by police identified.

The apparently suicidal man killed by police Saturday evening at Best Western Hotel in Greeley has been identified as Brian Croissant, 36, the Weld County Coroner's Office reported.

Hotel staff described Croissant, who stayed at the hotel several times during the past year, as a polite and friendly gentleman.

Details of the shooting, which occurred just after 5 p.m. in room 119, were referred to the Weld County District Attorney's Office on Sunday. Weld County District Attorney Ken Buck could not be reached for comment Sunday.

Croissant had checked in at 5 p.m. Saturday, said Stan Snow, Best Western general manager, and the shooting occurred about 5:10 p.m.

"We were just about chock-full," Snow said. "... It was a shock to the system."

Many of the hotel's roughly 300 guests were in town for the Rocky Mountain Showdown, a weekend girls volleyball tournament involving 157 teams. Most of the girls were at matches around Greeley at the time of the shooting, Snow said.

On Saturday, police responded to a call of a possible suicidal person at the hotel, 701 8th St., and were asked to check on him. When officers found Croissant, he was threatening to kill himself with a knife.

When officers approached him, he charged with the knife and was shot, a Greeley Police spokesman said Saturday night. He died of the wounds, though the coroner's office did not disclose time of death or the number of bullets that hit him.

Snow said the shooting occurred in Croissant's room, which was on the first floor.

"One of my ladies (at the front desk), the one who called me, she counted at least eight (shots), then the fire alarms went off," he said.

Croissant's residence was not available, but Snow said he registered under a post office box address in Briggsdale. Croissant typically dressed business-like when staying at the hotel, said Snow, adding that he thought Croissant worked in the oil drilling business.

"All my guest service ladies frankly speak very highly of him," Snow said. "He was always a gentleman, very pleasant, very polite. He used to chat with them when he came to town and showed them pictures of his children and family and so forth."

Several hotel guests reported hearing the shots. One witness said he heard five or six shots and saw several police officers in the hallway afterward.

The hallway where the shooting occurred had 15 rooms, about half of which had been sold at the time of the incident. Police taped off the hallway after the shooting -- it remained taped until Sunday morning; room 119 was taped off until 4 p.m. -- and affected guests were relocated to a dozen unsold rooms elsewhere in the hotel. A couple guests left for another hotel.

Snow, who lives in Eaton, rushed to the hotel immediately after being called Saturday night. He said guests handled the incident "extremely graciously" and his staff "held it together. I'm very, very proud of them."

"Out of character, it really was," Snow said of Croissant.

The incident remains under investigation by the Weld County District Attorney's Office and the Greeley Police Department.

 

[Troop]

Downtown is starting to make the Evans "jungle" look like Cherry Hills