Video: Police Shoot ‘Frenzied’ Man Armed With Box Cutter

Warning: Potentially disturbing footage - viewer discretion is advised

Police in Asheville, North Carolina, released body camera footage of an officer-involved shooting of a man who allegedly attacked him with a box cutter.

Jonathan Alan Bedrosian was convicted after pleading guilty to an assault charge earlier this month, WLOS-TV reported on Sept. 19.

He is accused of attacking Lt. Michael Lamb with a box cutter, and police said Lamb shot the suspect three times during the incident. Bedrosian survived the May 11 incident.

The Citizen-Times reported that Bedrosian stabbed and slashed Lamb with the box cutter.

Police had responded to a call on the back porch of Bedrosian’s room at the In Town Motor Lodge. The hotel manager called the police after he heard him shouting gibberish and smashing objects inside the room.

Police first tried to enter through the front, but Bedrosian didn’t open the door.

Police in Asheville, N.C., released body camera footage of an officer-involved shooting of a man who allegedly attacked him with a box cutter. Asheville Police

Lamb tried to enter through the back door, and Bedrosian charged at him with the box cutter in hand, according to the Citizen-Times.

“Lt. Lamb could easily have been killed in this encounter,” Asheville Police Chief Tammy Hooper said, adding that it was a “frenzied attack.”

“By trying to gain a visual into the room, he could see possibly if there was another person in there that we didn’t know about. He could see if Mr. Bedrosian had weapons, if he himself had been injured or injured himself. So, that was the purpose for getting around to the back,” she also said of the incident, WYFF reported.

Bedrosian faces a minimum of 36 months in prison after the plea, the report said.

Line of Duty Deaths for 2018

The Officer Down Memorial Page says that 108 officers have died in the line of duty in 2018, including K-9 officers. Forty officers have been shot and killed this year, the page states.

In a recent example, Mark V. Stasyuk, a sheriff’s deputy in Sacramento County, California, was shot and killed on Sept. 17.

He was shot as “he and another a deputy responded to a disturbance call at an auto parts store,” the page says. “A male subject opened fire on them without warning as they arrived on the scene, fatally wounding Deputy Stasyuk and wounding the other officers. Other responding deputies shot and wounded the suspect as he fled on foot. The man was then taken into custody,” it adds.

Traffic Stops Dangerous for Police

In early August, a video was released by police in Pennsylvania showing a man opening fire on two officers. One of the officers was critically wounded in the incident.

The National Law Enforcement Memorial Fund (pdf) said traffic stops are notoriously dangerous for police officers in the United States. The leading causes for officers being shot and killed in 2017 occurred when they were responding to domestic incidents and while conducting traffic stops, the group’s annual report says.

And, according to the most recent figures published by the U.S. Bureau of Justice Statistics, males make up a greater percentage of drivers pulled over (12 percent) than females (8 percent). “In 2011, about 3 percent of traffic stops led to a search of the driver, the vehicle, or both. Police were more likely to search male drivers (4 percent) than female drivers (2 percent),” the report said.