A Denver police officer seriously wounded in December was struck by friendly fire, a report released Friday by prosecutors says.
Technician John Ruddy was struck in the upper leg by a round fired from the rifle of a fellow officer, according the report issued by District Attorney Mitch Morrissey in a letter to Denver’s police chief.
Evidence showed the round passed through Philip Munoz, , before hitting Ruddy, investigators found.
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The shooting happened on Dec. 2 near the intersection of West 25th Avenue and Meade Street in the city’s Sloan’s Lake neighborhood as tactical officers were trying to arrest Munoz.
Munoz, 35, was sought on a warrant issued out of Adams County for shooting his ex-girlfriend and in another case in which he allegedly kidnapped and attempted to shoot another ex-girlfriend.
The warrant was being served by the FBI’s Rocky Mountain Safe Street’s Task Force, comprised of federal, state and local officers, who requested assistance from the Denver Police Department’s SWAT team.
Ruddy told investigators in an interview that he realized during the encounter he was standing in the wrong place and exposing himself to police crossfire.
“Terrible!” Ruddy said, according to the report.
Authorities had not previously said Ruddy was struck by friendly fire before the release of Morrissey’s letter.
The prosecutors report cleared the two officers — Technician James Bradley and Technician Brett Titus — who fired during the fatal encounter of criminal charges both for killing Munoz and wounding Ruddy.
Investigators say Munoz was armed with a handgun and Bradley and Titus had reason to fear for their safety and the safety of other officers when they shot and killed him.
According to Morrissey’s letter, a gun found on Munoz — a .380-calber semi-automatic pistol — was unloaded. A loaded magazine, however, was later discovered in a yard near where the shooting happened.
Munoz had gunshot wounds to his head, back and thighs, according to a coroner’s report within the letter. He was also found to be under the influence of alcohol, amphetamines and methamphetamines.
Bradley and Titus together fired seven rounds during the shooting.
Officers first tried to arrest Munoz in an alley while he was behind the wheel of a stolen Dodge Charger, but he sped away before being boxed in by police vehicles. At one point he held his handgun to his head during a subsequent standoff, according to the letter.
He then fled on foot while holding the handgun before he was killed.
Officers also tried to use less-lethal rounds to arrest Munoz during their encounter with him in the alley, but those were ineffective, according to the report.
“For 20 minutes, the officers made repeated efforts to gain Munoz’s compliance and have him surrender peacefully,” Morrissey wrote in his letter. “Officers made repeated attempts to reason with him and repeatedly deployed less-lethal devices in attempts to disarm him and get him to comply with their requests. At every juncture, Munoz refused to comply.”
The shooting was witnessed by nearly two dozen civilians in the area who respectively corroborated different parts of police officers’ accounts of the encounter.
Neighbors told The Denver Post that the scene was chaotic.
“Any reasonable police officer confronted with these facts would conclude that Munoz was desperate and was not going to surrender peacefully,” Morrissey wrote.
Jesse Paul: 303-954-1733, jpaul@denverpost.com or @JesseAPaul
