The Seattle Police Department offered a firmer time line of the events that led to the fatal shooting of a 50-year-old man on Boren Avenue by Officer Ian Birk—a two-year veteran of the department—but few details on what led to the fatality or if it could have been prevented, in the end, called on potential witnesses to come forward with more details to help with the investigation.

"We don't know why [the officer] didn't call for backup first," said Deputy Chief Nick Metz. Metz also said that it was unclear if the man made any gestures or lunged at the officer before the shooting, but said that when interviewed, the officer believed his safety was in danger.

• The knife confiscated from the victim (click to enlarge)

Metz said the officer wasn't equipped with a Taser. But even if he was, "We don’t recommend officers using a Taser [when approaching someone with a knife]," explains Metz. "A knife is considered a deadly weapon."

However, the knife the victim was carrying had a three-inch blade, which is legal under the city's municipal code.

As for more de-escalation training, "that works for a benign situation," says Chief Diaz. "It becomes much more dicey when there’s a situation with a potential deadly weapon involved."

In its entirety, from reviewing police footage, SPD says the incident—from the officer pulling over to the time of the shooting—happened in under a minute. The officer saw the man crossing Howell Street with a wooden board and a knife. He stopped his patrol car and turned on emergency lights, which activates the in-car patrol camera. SPD confirmed that the footage shows both the man with the knife and the officer cross in front of the camera and then go out of view, but the department has no footage of the actual incident. "We could hear through microphone, the officer tell the man three times to drop the knife," Metz reiterated. The man refused the officer’s orders. From approximately nine to 10 feet away, the officer fired four rounds. "The man went down, the officer called for backup, and officers arrived within a minute and a half," Metz explained. The man was declared dead at the scene.

Chief Diaz reiterated that the situation is still under investigation. "My pledge to you is to conduct a transparent investigation, and a complete investigation," he said. Chief Diaz then called on anyone who might have been a witness to the incident to contact SPD's homicide department with information.

An incident last night in the Denny regrade, in which an officer fatally shot a man who refused to comply with a police officer's orders, is raising questions in comments and around the city—was this an excessive use of force? Couldn't the officer have used a non-lethal weapon to subdue this man instead? Does the Seattle Police Department need more de-escalation training?

Here are the basic facts of yesterday's shooting, as reported by the the SPD Blotter:

The officer noted that the man was holding a knife [and was whittling, according to other reports]. The officer thought that this was unusual and potentially dangerous behavior. The officer stopped his patrol car and made contact with the man. The officer instructed the man to put the knife down. The man refused and stood up to face the officer with the knife still in hand. The officer again ordered the man to put the knife down. When the man refused the officer fired several shots, fatally striking the man.

Seattlepi.com has more details.

It's worth noting that before John Diaz was sworn in as the police chief on August 16, the Seattle City Council presented him with a four-point letter highlighting the areas where the Seattle Police Department needs to make dramatic improvements. One of areas was in the department's training and emphasis of de-escalation techniques.

The council wrote that Diaz needed to "quickly develop and fully implement the most effective training available for minimizing and de-escalating conflict in encounters between officers and civilians."

How is that coming along?

"I know that's being worked on," says Sgt. Sean Whitcomb, a spokesman for SPD, referring to the departments plans to invest in more de-escalation training for officers. But he also notes that SPD training is all de-escalation based at heart. "Officers are trained to enter into tense and possibly violent situations, gain control, and diffuse that possibility of violence," he says. "Sometimes force is necessary to do that."

The SPD isn't commenting on how far away the man was from the officer when he was shot, or whether or not the officer had non-lethal weapons like pepper spray or a Taser at his disposal.

And from what we know, the officer appears to have followed the correct protocol.

According to a 2001 SPD's report on officers' use of force (.pdf), the officer wouldn't have been trained to respond to a knife with these non-lethal weapons (like pepper spray or a Taser). The report states, "It is recommended that officers meet force with superior force," meaning officers are trained, if they see person armed with a lethal weapon—like a knife—to reach for their guns. However, the report states that officers are also "trained to call for back up in use of force situations. This is done to prevent an incident from escalating to the point that a greater use of force may be required."

Given these facts, once the officer spotted the man holding a knife, he knew that he might have to employ his gun. But the man was whittling when the officer contacted him—not threatening anyone or posing any immediate danger—meaning the officer wasn't diffusing a violent situation. Why, then, didn't he wait for for backup—as the reports suggests officers should be trained to do?

It's impossible to know exactly what happened in this situation, and SPD isn't commenting further at this point. However, situations like this—minor incidents that escalate to death—would raise fewer questions if SPD showed the public that it was committed to investing in more de-escalation training, as council members urged earlier this month.

UPDATE: SPD is holding a press conference at 3:30 p.m. today to address yesterday's fatal shooting.