A D.C. police officer is on administrative leave after shooting a man with whom he struggled during a search for another man who was accused of hitting a woman with a metal box, the Metropolitan Police Department (MPD) said.
The 38-year-old man who was shot was later charged with drug crimes, and a 59-year-old man was charged in the assault, police said.
Following the shooting, MPD began investigating the officer and reviewing body-worn camera footage from the scene. MPD's Internal Affairs Bureau is investigating the shooting, according to a news release.
A woman called 911 at about 10 a.m. Friday and said a man hit her with a metal box in the 1300 block of Good Hope Road SE. (An earlier version of this story said the woman was struck with a pipe.) She suffered injuries that are not considered life-threatening, according to a news release from Sunday.
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The woman gave police a description of her assailant. Shortly after that, an officer saw a man whom he thought matched the description getting into the passenger side of a burgundy Jeep.
"He kept turning, like, this way. He’s seated in the passenger seat. His hands go up, but it's a lot that's going on. What's not happening is he’s not getting out of the vehicle," MPD Police Chief Robert Contee said. "At some point during the course of this interaction, when the officer's saying, 'Stop reaching; stop reaching; stop reaching,' a shot is fired, and the person is struck."
Police identified the man as Steven Shaw, 38, of Northeast D.C. He was taken to the hospital and is expected to recover.
The officer was not injured in the shooting.
Officers later found a large number of drugs on Shaw, and he was charged with possession of intent to sell cocaine.
Wallace Lewis, 59, of Southeast D.C., was arrested Friday in connection with the assault, according to the release. He faces two charges: assault with significant bodily injury and threats to do bodily harm.
Body-worn camera footage from the incident has yet to be released.
