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Three SAPD officers charged with murder after gunning down woman in apartment, Chief McManus says

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Three SAPD officers charged with murder after gunning down woman in apartment, Chief McManus says

SAN ANTONIO – Three San Antonio police officers are charged with murder after gunning down a woman inside her apartment early Friday, according to Chief William McManus.

The three officers were identified as Sgt. Alfred Flores (14 years of service), Officer Eleazar Alejandro ( 5 years of service), and Officer Nathaniel Villalobos (2 years of service).

All of the officers were taken into custody. The department said the officers’ employment was terminated. In another instance, SAPD said they were suspended without pay. KSAT has reached out for further clarification.

The shooting happened early Friday morning in the 6200 block of Old Pearsall Road on the Southwest Side.

Officers were called just after midnight for a disturbance of a woman destroying property. Chief McManus said she was cutting wires through a fire alarm system to the complex — a felony of criminal mischief.

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The woman, identified as 46-year-old Melissa Melissa Perez, was speaking with the San Antonio Fire Department in the parking lot when police contacted her.

She provided them with her name, date of birth and apartment number.

McManus said Perez was having a mental health crisis, and officers tried to get her to go toward their patrol car. However, she ran back to her apartment and locked the door.

Police then tried to speak with her through an open window.

Still from bodycam video of shooting at apartment complex in the 6200 block of Old Pearsall Road. (KSAT 2023)

One of the officers then removed the screen door from the open window on the porch, according to McManus.

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Perez then reportedly reached for a glass candle and threw it at the officer.

Police backed away and waited for more officers and a supervisor to arrive at the scene, McManus said.

One group of officers was at the front of the apartment, and three officers were stationed at the back patio of the apartment — Flores, Alejandro and Villalobos.

The three officers tried to coax Perez out of the apartment, but she refused.

Soon after, two of the officers jumped the railing and got onto the patio, according to McManus. One of them said Perez picked up a hammer and was “approaching them from inside.”

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McManus said Perez swung the hammer from inside the apartment toward the officers and hit the window, breaking it.

One of the officers fired his weapon at Perez, but it didn’t appear that she was struck, according to SAPD.

Perez went toward the window again while still armed with the hammer, and all three officers opened fire, McManus said. She was hit by the gunfire at least two times.

After the shooting, officers forced their way inside the apartment and provided medical aid until EMS arrived. Perez died at the scene from her injuries.

McManus said the incident was reviewed by the department and the Bexar County District Attorney’s Civil Rights Division, and warrants were issued for the three officers.

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They’re all charged with murder and were taken into custody late Friday.

“The shooting officers’ actions were not consistent with SAPD’s policy and training. They placed themselves in a situation where they used deadly force, which was not reasonable given all the circumstances as we now understand them,” McManus said.

Three separate investigations will follow their arrests — two from SAPD’s Internal Affairs and Homicide Unit and one from the DA’s Civil Rights Division.

A breakdown of the officers’ body camera footage

WARNING: The bodycam video may contain images that are disturbing to some individuals. Viewer discretion is advised.

The bodycam video starts with one officer approaching Perez in the apartment complex’s parking lot while she is out with her dog.

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The officer then gets closer and says, “Hey, lady, get over here.”

Perez then began walking away, and the officer pursued her and yelled, “Get over here.”

She replies, “Nope,” and continues to walk toward her apartment. The officer begins running after her.

The bodycam video then shows the officer getting to the woman’s balcony and jumping over it.

There was a glimpse of the officer’s hand appearing to try to open the back door.

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The woman’s window was open, and the officer immediately began ripping the screen without saying anything to her.

She screams at him to stop trying to get in and tries to close the window.

The officer then pulled away and began raising his gun at the woman.

“You’re going to get shot,” the officer yells at her.

“Shoot me,” she replies.

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Glass is then heard shattering, and the woman yells something at the officers.

The video then cuts to multiple officers standing at the balcony and then one officer again jumping over it.

“Hold on,” the officer says.

The woman replies, “You ain’t got no warrant.”

Another officer then says, “Let’s go. Move it.”

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Two officers were then seen standing in the patio area.

One officer then turned around to reveal several officers who then all started yelling, “Watch out! Watch out!” before gunshots erupted from the officers toward the woman. From a different perspective, one of the officers could be seen trying to open the door again.

The woman appeared to be still standing.

The officers start yelling to her, “Hey! Hey!” and more gunshots go off.

From another perspective, multiple officers could be seen firing shots at the woman’s apartment.

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GMSA Coverage from shooting

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US to remove $10mn bounty for Syria’s Islamist rebel leader

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US to remove mn bounty for Syria’s Islamist rebel leader

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The US has said it will remove a $10mn bounty for Abu Mohammad al-Jolani, leader of Hayat Tahrir al-Sham, the Islamist group that spearheaded the overthrow of Syria’s Assad regime, in a sign that Washington is willing to engage with the new leadership.

In exchange, Jolani, who now goes by his birth name, Ahmed al-Sharaa, agreed that terrorist groups could not be allowed “to pose a threat inside of Syria or externally, including to the US and our partners in the region”, Barbara Leaf, the State Department’s top Middle East official, said on Friday.

Leaf met Jolani in Damascus earlier in the day and told reporters that lifting the bounty would allow US officials to engage with the rebel leader without having to turn him over to US law enforcement.

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Leaf said her meeting with Jolani was “quite good, very productive, detailed.”

“He came across as pragmatic,” she said, adding that he made “moderate” statements on equal protections for women and minorities. “We will judge by deeds, not just by words,” she added.

HTS is designated as a terrorist organisation by the US, EU, UN and others, which means Washington cannot offer the group material support, but it can communicate with its members. Jolani has said Assad’s departure means sanctions on the state should be lifted.

US officials have said they would consider lifting both the sanctions and the terrorist designation, which has been in place since 2018, if HTS proved its commitment to “inclusive” rule and to maintaining stability.

They say Jolani and an eventual transitional government will face internal pressure to take steps needed for the sanctions regime to be lifted.

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“I think there’s going to be quite a degree of internal pressure on both the interim authorities and then whatever transitional government comes a few months from now, to move in the direction that would, in fact, be consonant with the kind of requirements that we would have in terms of sanctions,” Leaf said.

She added that Jolani had stressed that he wanted to begin working on an economic recovery for Syria.

The US delegation to Damascus also included Roger Carstens, the US special envoy for hostages, and senior diplomat Daniel Rubenstein, who will be leading engagement with Syria.

The diplomats held meetings and visited a site in the capital as part of efforts to find Austin Tice, an American journalist who disappeared in Damascus in 2012.

Carstens said it was is unclear whether Tice was still alive. “The information that we have right now doesn’t confirm either one way or the other,” he said.

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US officials say they plan to engage with transitional officials and other Syrians in further trips to Syria as conditions allow.

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Watch: White House takes questions on looming government shutdown

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Watch: White House takes questions on looming government shutdown
Watch: White House takes questions on looming government shutdown – CBS News

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White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre spent most of her Friday press briefing answering questions about the possible government shutdown. Jean-Pierre said several times that Congress had a bipartisan deal and that House Speaker Mike Johnson needs to stick to it.

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Novo Nordisk shares tumble as weight-loss drug trial data disappoints

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Novo Nordisk shares tumble as weight-loss drug trial data disappoints

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Novo Nordisk, one of Europe’s largest companies, lost more than a quarter of its value on Friday after its latest obesity drug missed the drugmaker’s goal for an average of 25 per cent weight loss.

CagriSema helped patients lose an average of 22.7 per cent of their body weight in a late-stage trial, Novo Nordisk said on Friday, only marginally beating the results of Mounjaro, a rival treatment from Eli Lilly.

Martin Holst Lange, executive vice-president for development at Novo Nordisk, said that only 57 per cent of patients had received the highest dose of the drug. “We are encouraged by the weight-loss profile of CagriSema,” he said.

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The company’s shares were down as much as 27 per cent in mid-morning trading in Denmark.

Novo Nordisk and Eli Lilly are competing for dominance in a market that grew sevenfold in just three years to $24bn in 2023, according to data analytics firm Iqvia.

Novo Nordisk had hoped its “next generation” weight-loss drug could lead the field, after its shares had struggled to keep pace with Eli Lilly and it suffered a setback from disappointing results for an experimental weight-loss pill in September.

“CagriSema is really important for us,” chief executive Lars Fruergaard Jørgensen told the Financial Times in November. “It’s a next-generation product and it has the potential to be best in class.”

Patients receiving Mounjaro lost an average of 22.5 per cent of their weight in phase 3 trials when taken as part of a regime of improved diet and exercise. Those on Wegovy, also made by Novo Nordisk, lost an average of about 15 per cent in similar conditions.

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About 40 per cent of patients in the CagriSema trial achieved 25 per cent weight loss over the 68 weeks.

CagriSema combines semaglutide, the active ingredient in Wegovy and Ozempic, with cagrilintide, another hormone that makes people feel fuller for longer.

The trial of 3,417 people taking a weekly injection found that the most common side effects were gastrointestinal, the vast majority of which were mild and moderate and diminished over time.

This is a developing story

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