Prosecutors said Thursday that a pair of sheriff’s deputies and a Colorado Springs police officer wanted in the killing of his wife were justified and reasonable in their use of force.
Demetrius Mac Moore, 40, , in a confrontation with law enforcement near the intersection of Union and Boulder streets in Colorado Springs.
At the time, officers were trying to arrest Moore in the slaying of his wife, 42-year-old Alicia Christmas-Moore. They had tracked him down as he was driving a stolen Buick Rendezvous and then blocked him in at the intersection.
“Moore fired a .45-caliber handgun through the windshield of the Buick at officers,” prosecutors said in a news release Thursday. “El Paso County Sheriff’s Office deputies and Jeremy Juhl and Chris Donatell returned fire, striking the suspect.”
Moore was lying across the passenger seat of the vehicle and appeared to be incapacitated, the release said. Colorado Springs police tactical officers approached the Buick in an attempt to arrest Moore, but he sat up “with his arms displayed in a manner that led officers to believe he intended to fire his gun toward them.”
Officer Armando Newell fired downward into the vehicle at Moore and retreated, prosecutors say.
Eventually, SWAT units in an armored vehicle approached the Buick and removed Moore, who was dead.
The El Paso County District Attorney’s Office says the .45-caliber handgun found in the Buick was determined to be the gun used in the slaying of Moore’s wife several hours earlier.
“It was later learned through interviews that Mr. Moore had previously expressed his intent to engage in a shoot-out with the police,” the release said.
Moore, who lived in the Security-Widefield area, died of multiple gunshot wounds.
Alicia Christmas-Moore died of multiple gunshot wounds after she was found critically wounded on Oct. 22, 2016, by El Paso County sheriff’s deputies responding to reports of gunfire on the 4900 block of Brant Road near Security.
Authorities said Demetrius Mac Moore and Alicia Christmas-Moore had been married up until the months before the shooting.
