Man killed in officer-involved shooting – Medford News, Weather, Sports, Breaking News

Mail Tribune (Medford, OR — Wayback)

2021-07-07

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Man killed in officer-involved shooting By Joe Zavala and Nick Morgan Updated: Jul 07, 2021 01:37 PM A A A man believed to have broken and entered into an east Medford clinic was shot dead by police. Jerry Allan Gunter, 34, died before dawn Wednesday following an officer involved shooting at the Allergy and Asthma Center at 3860 Crater Lake Avenue, according to a releases issued by Medford police. Medford police dispatched two officers to the clinic after the business alarm went off at 2:44 a.m. The two officers found a broken window at 2:47 a.m. and other evidence of forced entry, and heard a suspect inside. Gunter reportedly relayed to police that he was armed with a knife. Backup units from Medford police and the Jackson County Sheriff’s Office arrived to surround the building. At 3:05 a.m., Gunther reportedly “suddenly exited the building and aggressively approached officers with the knife,” the Medford police release states. Two Medford officers fired guns at Gunter. Neither officer was injured. “The shooting occurred at a close distance,” the release states. Per Medford police policy, the officers are on paid administrative leave until a grand jury determines whether the shooting was justified. The incident was captured on officers’ body cameras. The footage will be released once Oregon State Police completes a thorough investigation, and after the Jackson County District Attorney’s Office presents the findings to a grand jury. Medford Police Lt. Mike Budreau said that it will likely be weeks before the investigation report makes its way to a grand jury. “It’s going to be several detectives working full-time if not including overtime to get the scene processed, to get all the evidence examined, which includes body-worn cameras, any surveillance cameras, and then obviously witness statements, witness officers, involved officers,” he said. “Then OSP is going to conduct a scene assessment that will involve forensics and trajectories and documenting the distance – where the officer was compared to the suspect. ….All that stuff takes time. And then that has to be documented in a report form, and once the district attorney has that they will present that to a grand jury.” Records show that Gunter was on probation at the time for a 2021 felony methamphetamine possession conviction out of Josephine County Circuit Court. His most recent criminal conviction was last month, when he pleaded guilty to second-degree criminal mischief for damaging a window on June 3 at Grants Pass City Hall by throwing a plastic bag containing a rock through a double pane window in an incident that was captured on surveillance cameras. The vandalism did about $500 worth of damage.