Officers Seriously Wound Homeless Man Wielding a Knife

Police officers shot and seriously wounded a man witnesses called a “street person” Wednesday after he approached the officers near a downtown Los Angeles intersection with a knife in his hand, authorities said.

Los Angeles Police Lt. William Hall, who heads the department’s officer-involved shooting team, said the officers had stopped to talk to “a homeless person who was drinking wine on the street” near 7th and Mateo streets Wednesday afternoon.

As they began to cite the wine drinker, Hall said, the man wielding the knife approached and threatened the officers. Although the officers ordered the man to drop his weapon, “he kept approaching them and backed them into the street,” said Hall. “However, when he got too close and they were in fear of their lives, they fired.”