No Charges Against Officer In March Shooting At Penland Park

ANCHORAGE (KTUU) – The Office of Special Prosecutions will not prosecute an Anchorage Police officer who shot and killed a man in the Penland Parkway trailer court in March of this year.

Officer Randy Morales shot and killed 20-year-old Zander Clark on March 24, 2018. Clark had been reported for stabbing his girlfriend in the Home Depot parking lot, and after Morales responded to the scene, Clark ran into the Penland Park neighborhood.

The Department of Law review found that Clark “made himself an instantaneous threat to Officer Morales’ life and physical wellbeing,” particularly given that he had recently stabbed someone.

The review lays out the timeline of Morales’ response. At 6:28 p.m., Morales and other APD officers were dispatched to the Northway Mall Home Depot store for a reported stabbing in the parking lot. Morales saw Clark walking away from the stabbing scene, near the intersection of Penland Parkway and Rodeo Place. Morales asked dispatchers for an updated suspect description, which fit Clark.

Video from the patrol car shows, the report says, that Morales stopped his patrol car and commanded Clark to stop, but Clark instead extended the blade of his knife, held it out by his side and walked toward the front of the patrol car. Clark then kept walking toward the officer, yelling, “Please shoot me!” the review states. Officer Morales backed away from Clark, putting the back of the patrol car between the two of them.

Once Clark got to the front bumper of the patrol car, the report says, Clark turned and ran away. “No shots were fired at that time,” the report notes. Morales radioed dispatchers and told them the suspect had drawn a knife and advanced toward him.

Morales followed Clark on foot into the Penland Park neighborhood, where they went out of view of the patrol car’s camera, though a microphone on Officer Morales captured audio of the rest of the incident.

The road conditions were described in the report as “rutty” with ice, slippery and wet, with high snow berms that would make moving out of the street difficult. It also says there were few cars and essentially nothing for the officer to place between himself and Clark.

On the audio recording, the report says Officer Morales can be heard breathing heavily, and yelling “Drop the knife!” and then shots are heard, before the officer tells dispatchers that shots were fired.

Anchorage Police said at the time that Clark had “turned around, with knife in hand, and ran straight towards the officer.”

As soon as other officers arrived, Clark was found dead in the street, a Kershaw pocket knife was nearby with its blade extended and what appeared to be droplets of blood on the blade.

The Department of Law’s review concluded that Clark came within a “patrol car’s length” of the officer with the knife, “and even though Officer Morales did not fire his weapon at this time, Clark’s actions were threatening.”

“Clark made himself an instantaneous threat to Officer Morales’ life and physical wellbeing. As such, the State cannot say that Officer Morales’ use of deadly force in this situation was legally unjustified,” the report concludes.