A Westminster police officer shot and killed an armed man during a domestic violence incident in Arvada’s Lamar Heights neighborhood on Saturday morning, Arvada Police Department officials said.
Police arrived at an apartment at Willow Green Townhomes, 6989 Sheridan Blvd., at 7:11 a.m. after getting calls about a “disturbance involving an assault” and that there were multiple people, including children, and guns in the home.
Officers entered the home and found one person who was being kept against their will and safely removed two women and a child from the home, Arvada police said. The Westminster Police Department also responded to the scene and deployed a drone to help with surveillance.
Witnesses told police there were two men still inside who were believed to be armed, and officers saw one man crawl out of a window onto the roof while armed and then go back inside.
At 8:03 a.m., the man came back onto the roof and got a gun, which is when a Westminster officer shot the man and he fell on the roof.
Paramedics could not immediately get to the man because police did not know what was going on inside the apartment, Arvada officials wrote. Officers used a drone to monitor him and saw he “showed no signs of life.”
The Jefferson County SWAT Team searched the apartment and did not find anyone else inside. The man was pronounced dead at 11 a.m., and investigators found two guns near his body and another gun in the apartment.
It’s not clear what happened to the second man described by witnesses, and investigators are still looking into whether he left the home before police arrived, department spokesperson Chase Amos said.
Arvada police are investigating the assault and the 17th Judicial District Critical Incident Response Team is investigating the police shooting.
Updated 5:47 p.m. May 2, 2026: Because of a reporter’s error, a previous version of this story misreported which police department the officer who shot the suspect was from. The officer was from the Westminster Police Department. The story has been updated.
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