Before a Las Cruces Police Department officer shot and killed Amelia Baca, her granddaughter pleaded with the officer not to shoot.
"I don't even know how many times I yelled at him, 'don't shoot her she's mentally ill'," the granddaughter told an LCPD detective during a recorded interview after the killing.
Body camera footage released by LCPD and the City of Las Cruces shows two interviews conducted after the shooting that shed light on the killing of a woman holding two kitchen knives, and amid a mental health crisis, on April 16.
The first video features an interview with a family member, Baca's granddaughter Albitar Inoh, who witnessed the shooting. The second video features an interview with an unnamed officer who supported the shooter as the incident unfolded. The videos also revealed several other nuggets of information previously unreported.
For one, Inoh discloses that Baca had not been diagnosed with dementia but did exhibit signs of mental illness such as forgetfulness. The interviews show that Baca was a Spanish speaker who did not speak English. Additionally, the police officer's statement reveals he does not speak Spanish. It's unclear if the officer who shot Baca spoke Spanish.
While the two videos shed some light on the killing, LCPD and the city have not released the full body camera video or the name of the officer who shot and killed the 75-year-old woman. The department has released over two dozen videos of officers amid the shooting's aftermath and produced a video that implied Baca was a threat.
I told them plenty of times, 'don't shoot her, she's mentally ill," Inoh said to the detective interviewing her. "There was no danger."
A crisis unfolds
Inoh told an LCPD detective that her involvement with the incident began when her mother got a call from a family member saying that Baca was having a mental health crisis. Inoh and her mother then head to the house on the 800 block of Fir Avenue.
According to a police-produced narrative video, another of Baca's daughters was inside the home and called 911. The narrative includes portions of the 911 call.
"I really need an officer or an ambulance or someone because my mother is getting really aggressive," the daughter said. "I'm hiding in a room because she's threatening to kill me."
The daughter advised the dispatcher that her 75-year-old mom suffers from dementia. Later in the call, the daughter said her mom has a knife. When the dispatcher asked what Baca was doing with the knife, the daughter said Baca was "stabbing the floor."
In the narrative, police said the daughter said she was hiding in a bedroom with her husband and a child and that another daughter was in the home. That information is not in the 911 call snippets included in the video.
It's unclear what happened to those family members. When asked, Inoh told police they weren't inside the house when she arrived. The police officer said in his interview that he believed the family left through a window.