A 28-year-old Federal Heights man has been identified as the man who was fatally shot by Westminster police early Wednesday, officials say.
Albert LeRoy Lucero, 28, died of multiple gunshot wounds inside a duplex in the 7100 block of Hooker Street at about 5 a.m., according to Adams County Coroner James Hibbard.
Police are not releasing any new details today about the three-hour pursuit of a stolen-car suspect that led to Lucero’s death.
Lucero had prior domestic-violence and theft convictions.
Police won’t say whether Lucero is the same person who fled from officers in a stolen GMC Yukon starting about 1 a.m. at West 72nd Avenue and Federal Boulevard.
Just before 3 a.m., the driver crashed through police cars in a Hamburger Stand restaurant parking lot under a hail of gunfire, before ditching the SUV about 2 miles away in Arvada at about 3:10 a.m., Westminster police investigator Wayne Read said previously.
“I heard a boom, boom, boom, boom, boom,” said Elena Chavez, 50, who lives across the street from where Lucero was later killed. The restaurant where the gunshots were fired is just around the corner.
“I jumped out of bed,” Chavez said. “I saw three cop cars streaming by.”
Two hours later, officers entered the Hooker Street duplex apartment and shot Lucero after he presented what police called “a deadly threat.” Read said he could not disclose what that threat was or whether the man had a weapon.
At about 5 a.m., Chavez said she heard two more shots. When she looked out her window across the street she saw numerous police officers entering the apartment with guns drawn. Soon, the street in front of her house was jammed with 11 patrol cars.
Investigators have not said whether they are looking for others involved in the Yukon theft or the chase.
According to neighbors, police soon arrested two women who had been in the same apartment at the duplex where the shooting happened.
One of the two was Andrea Evig, 34, who is being held at the Adams County Detention Facility on a 5-year community corrections sentence out of Denver for theft of over $15,000, according to jail records.
Hibbard said an autopsy is being performed this afternoon.
A task force of law-enforcement officers from throughout the 17th Judicial District will investigate the police shooting, which is standard procedure.
The officers involved are on paid leave, which also is a standard procedure.
Lucero was convicted of theft in Adams County in 2001 and paid a fine, according to Colorado Bureau of Investigation records. The same year, he was convicted of misdemeanor domestic violence and sentenced to a year of probation, CBI records say.
In 2003, he was convicted of felony menacing with a weapon in another domestic-violence case and was sentenced to two years of intensive probation, according to state records.
He received a 90-day suspended jail sentence in 2004 for a conviction of drunken driving and child abuse. In 2005, an aggravated robbery charge filed against him in Adams County was later dismissed, CBI records indicate.
Dozens of people stop by the apartment where Lucero was shot, stay for a minute, and then drive away, Chavez said. She has long suspected that drugs are sold at the apartment, she said.
An undercover police officer dressed as a homeless man flashed his badge to her 26-year-old son in front of the apartment recently, she said. She said she believes he was doing a drug investigation.
Kirk Mitchell: 303-954-1206 or kmitchell@denverpost.com
