Local News
Police response to a man’s mental health crisis turned chaotic Saturday, resulting in multiple injured officers and emergency responders.
Boston police officers investigate a fatal shooting on Hemenway Street near the Northeastern University campus. John Tlumacki/The Boston Globe
Prosecutors have identified a man who was shot and killed Saturday by Boston police after he called 911 during a mental health crisis.
Police killed Jacob Graves, 29, outside his Hemenway Street apartment after he attacked multiple police officers and emergency responders with a “sword-like weapon,” according to the Suffolk County District Attorney’s Office. The scene unfolded Saturday morning not far from Northeastern University‘s campus.
Graves was a former student at Berklee College of Music, but did not graduate, The Boston Globe reported. Police responded to his apartment after he made a distress call to 911.
Graves reportedly believed that there were four people with guns attempting to harm him, according to Boston Police Commissioner Michael Cox. When officers arrived, they spoke with him through his apartment door and requested help from Boston Emergency Medical Services (EMS), who determined that he was having a mental health crisis.
After first responders talked to him for about 45 minutes, Graves opened his door, armed with a weapon, officials have said. At a press conference Saturday, Cox referred to the weapon as a sword, but the DA’s office is now saying it was “sword-like.”
Graves used his weapon to stab an officer in the arm and knock an EMS clinician to the ground, according to Cox. Multiple officers then fired both their tasers and their weapons, killing him.
Cox said “multiple” police officers suffered non-life-threatening injuries but did not specify the extent of the other officers’ injuries. Two emergency responders, including the clinician, were taken to the hospital with non-life-threatening injuries, Boston EMS said on Facebook.
The officer-involved shooting is the latest in a series of violent incidents that have taken place near Northeastern’s campus in the past two weeks. On March 27, a student was reportedly stabbed outside the Marino Recreation Center, according to The Huntington News, Northeastern’s independent student-run newspaper. He was taken to a nearby hospital with non-life-threatening injuries.
On April 1, a man, who is not a student, was stabbed near the intersection of Huntington Avenue and Gainsborough Street and hospitalized with non-life-threatening injuries. That evening, Boston police responded to reports of shots fired on Gainsborough Street, though no victims were confirmed.
Several Northeastern students and a faculty member gathered Monday to protest what they described as a lack of communication from university administration about the recent violence. They told Boston.com that a lack of reliable alerts from the university has prompted students to turn to outside sources for information.
Officials said Boston police and the DA’s office are actively investigating Saturday’s incident. The identities of the involved officers have not been released.
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