A man was shot and wounded by Los Angeles police officers on Saturday afternoon, October 31, 2026, in downtown Los Angeles after, police say, he charged at officers and struck one of them with a metal bar during a robbery response. Both the man and the injured officer were taken to hospital and were in stable condition, the Los Angeles Police Department said.
Source: MyNewsLA / City News Service, reporting the LAPD
The shooting happened at about 1:25 p.m. at Fourth and Omar streets, according to the LAPD. In its first report of the incident, the department's Officer J. Chaves told City News Service the shooting occurred at 1:23 p.m. and that officers from the Central Division had closed off Omar and Fourth streets to San Pedro and Fourth streets for the investigation, urging the public to avoid the area.
The police account of the confrontation
According to an LAPD statement reported by City News Service, officers responding to a robbery call encountered a man holding a metal bar in one hand and a long tree branch in the other. Officers told him multiple times to “drop the weapon,” the statement said. The man's actions are described here as police allege them; he had not been publicly identified and no charges had been announced in the reports available.
When the man did not comply, officers “deployed less-lethal foam rounds to no effect,” the LAPD statement read. Police say the man then charged and struck an officer with the metal bar, and an officer-involved shooting followed, in which the man was struck by gunfire and taken into custody.
Conditions and the scene
The man and the officer who was struck were both taken to hospitals for treatment, and both had stable vital signs, police said. No other injuries occurred. The metal bar was booked as evidence, police said.
The investigation was underway at the scene, which police expected to be shut down for several hours. A second outlet reporting the same LAPD account, InterNewsCast, said the department described the details as preliminary, said the investigation was still in its early stages, and quoted police saying there was no ongoing threat to the community.
Source: InterNewsCast, reporting the LAPD shooting in downtown Los Angeles
Police had not released the man's name or age, the injured officer's name, how many officers fired, or what the original robbery call involved. Those details, and any video the department releases, will be the next test of the police account.
What happens next
Officer-involved shootings in Los Angeles are investigated by the department, and the findings and any body-camera or surveillance video normally emerge in stages rather than on the day itself. For now, the formal record is the LAPD's own statement: a robbery call, a man with a metal bar and a branch, orders to drop the weapon, less-lethal foam rounds that police say did not work, an officer struck, and shots fired.
For people who live and work around Fourth and Omar — a downtown corner near San Pedro Street — the road closures were the immediate impact on Saturday afternoon, and the department's next update is expected to name the man, describe any charges, and update the conditions of both men in hospital.