A 43-year-old man is dead after being shot by police at a west-end Hamilton apartment building Saturday, in an incident which also sent an officer to hospital, Ontario’s police watchdog says.
The Special Investigations Unit (SIU) said it’s investigating the shooting that took place around 5 p.m. at an apartment building on Main Street W.
Hamilton police were called to the building after a resident reported a man was acting in a “threatening manner,” said the SIU in a news release.
Officers went to the fifth floor and “at some point, they became involved in an interaction with a man,” the SIU said.
The SIU initially said there was an exchange of gunfire, “resulting in both the man and officer suffering gunshot wounds.”
However, an update sent by the police watchdog after 7 p.m. says that, based on further investigation, it does not appear the man discharged a firearm.
Hamilton police posted on social media Saturday that the officer was confronted by a man with a gun.
The officer sustained non-life-threatening injuries, while the man was in a life-threatening condition, Hamilton police said.
SIU said the man passed away in hospital just before 1 a.m. Sunday.
The officer has since been released, SIU said.
Six SIU investigators and two forensic investigators are looking into what happened.
The SIU is an independent government agency that investigates the conduct of police officers in incidents that may have resulted in death, serious injury, sexual assault or the discharge of a firearm at a person.