NEW ORLEANS — NOPD has released video showing the moment that an officer fired shots at the man accused of killing NOPD officer Marcus McNeil.
Shortly after midnight Oct. 14, four NOPD officers in two separate vehicles tried to initiate a traffic stop on 30-year-old Darren Bridges in the area of Tara Lane and Cindy Place in New Orleans East.
Chief Michael Harrison said Bridges fled from the officers, prompting a chase and a struggle between Bridges and Officer McNeil. Bridges then shot and killed McNeil.
Video released by NOPD today shows Officer Stephen Stephano, one of the other officers who was at the scene, running after hearing the gunshots. Stephano then fired five rounds at Bridges, who was hit three times. The video shows Stephano firing the gun, but it does not show Bridges getting shot.
Harrison said the release of the video is part of the NOPD’s overall commitment to transparency in use-of-force investigations.
NOPD said after he was shot, Bridges hid in an apartment on Cindy Place until a SWAT team eventually got him to surrender.
Stephano has been reassigned to desk duty pending the outcome of an internal use-of-force investigation, Harrison said.
McNeil, a 29-year-old, married father of two young children and graduate of St. Augustine High School, had been with NOPD since 2015. Before that, he spent five years working as a children’s literacy coach for the Children’s Defense Fund.
Bridges was treated at a local hospital after the shooting and remains in the Orleans Parish Prison on the following charges: first-degree murder of a police officer, with possession of a firearm or weapon by a felon, illegal carrying of a weapon with controlled dangerous substance, possession of heroin, possession of crack cocaine and possession of Alprazolam.
