Dillan Tabares, 27, had been paroled from state prison (above in his mugshot) a week before he was fatally shot by police in a videotaped encounter outside of a California convenience store
A man who was fatally shot by police in a videotaped encounter outside of a California convenience store was a Navy veteran with a history of drug use and mental illness.
Dillan Tabares, 27, had been paroled from state prison a week before the shooting and was considered an absconder, according to his family and records released on Monday.
He was fatally shot on Friday after a physical confrontation with a Huntington Beach police officer outside of a 7-Eleven. Video clips from bystanders posted on Facebook and Twitter show Tabares punching the officer before the two fall to the ground.
Tabares could be seen grabbing something from the officer’s belt before Tabares jumped to his feet and was shot.
His brother Brandon Tabares said his life had unraveled into homelessness, drug use and mental illness after he failed a drug test and was discharged from the Navy five years ago.
Video clips that captured the shooting, which were filmed from inside a car in the parking lot, start with the officer pointing a stun gun at Tabares (above) and ordering him to sit down
This clip appears to show Tabares (above) throwing punches at the police officer during a scuffle outside of the 7-Eleven. The officer appears to get Tabares in a headlock and they wrestle to the ground
Once they are on the ground, the cop can be heard shouting, ‘let go of my gun!’ though he appears to retain full control of the weapon during the encounter. Moments later, Tabares stands up and the officer fires his weapon striking the 27-year-old several times (above)
Tabares had a series of arrests in California and was released on parole September 14 after serving about 18 months for a felony battery conviction, according to state parole records. He absconded and was marked as a ‘parolee-at-large’ on September 20 – two days before the shooting.
Dillan’s brother Brandon Tabares said his life had unraveled into homelessness, drug use and mental illness after he failed a drug test and was discharged from the Navy five years ago
Tabares joined the Navy in 2008 and served as an Information technology systems technician aboard a guided-missile cruiser and amphibious assault ship before he was discharged in April 2012.
While he was serving in the military, he bought a house in Norfolk, Virginia, and got married. But after he failed the drug test – testing positive for marijuana – he was discharged, lost his home, and his wife filed for divorce.
Brandon said Tabares then moved to California, spent time backpacking with his brother and started dating one of his brother’s friends. When they broke up, Dillan ‘didn’t brush himself off.’
Instead, he started living in a park behind the public library in Huntington Beach and was known among locals as ‘the kid who lived in the woods,’ according to his brother.
‘He was always high on drugs – so high that he had become a drug-induced paranoid schizophrenic,’ Brandon said of his brother.
Dillan Tabares mans an M240B machine gun on the bridge wing of the guided-missile cruiser USS Anzio. He was discharged from the navy after testing positive to marijuana
Melissa Cazares, a resident of Huntington Beach, places a candle outside the 7Eleven store where Dillan was fatally shot
His family repeatedly sought help for him and he was treated at psychiatric facilities.
Dillan Tabares also wrote several angry posts about police on Facebook, including one in 2015 that contended police officers were working with al-Qaeda as part of a sex trafficking ring.
‘He had a distaste for police officers, no doubt about that, but not to the extent that he’d go out of his way to attack them,’ Brandon said of his brother.
The video clips, which was filmed from inside a car in the parking lot, start with the officer pointing a stun gun at Tabares and ordering him to sit down.
Tabares seems unaffected when the officer fires the stun gun and quickly rushes toward the officer before repeatedly punching him.
The officer appears to get Tabares in a headlock and they wrestle to the ground. Once they are on the ground, the officer can be heard shouting: ‘Let go of my gun!’ though he appears to retain full control of the weapon during the entire encounter.
Tabares stumbled on his feet and staggered backwards before the cop fired his seventh shot
Tabares was rushed to a hospital where he later died of his injures. Police have not released the name of the officer involved in the shooting
Moments later, Tabares stands up and the officer fires his weapon striking the 27-year-old several times. He is seen stumbling backward before falling to the ground against a wall.
A second video, which was posted on Twitter on Friday, showed Tabares grabbing an object from the officer’s belt as they struggled next to a parked car.
The officer then pulls out his gun and backs away. Another video clip shows Tabares jumping to his feet and he’s almost immediately shot. Six rounds are fired before the officer calls out, ‘get on the ground.’ After a short pause, a final, seventh gunshot is fired and Tabares stumbles backward and collapses against a wall.
Huntington Beach Police Chief Robert Handy said the officer had been forced to defend himself and had the right to fatally shoot the man if he felt his life was in danger.
‘This is clearly an assault on an officer,’ Handy told reporters Friday.
‘I don’t know what preceded that assault, we don’t know that yet, but clearly this person attacked our police officer, and I don’t think that there’s any way an officer is expected to not defend them self and that includes a lethal force at times.’