The state Attorney General’s Office cleared two officers of any criminal wrongdoing in the fatal shooting of a man wielding a replica shotgun in downtown Santa Ana, but recommended the city review its policies for rendering aid to a downed suspect and clearing out people from a potential shooting scene.
Emergency calls to police started coming in just before 5:10 p.m., Dec. 1, 2024, regarding 31-year-old Noe Rodriguez Martinez on First Street in downtown Santa Ana with a shotgun, according to the attorney general’s report. Two customers leaving Casa Linda Furniture Store also spotted him with what appeared to be a shotgun so they went back into the business at 116 N. Broadway and asked a worker to call police.
Officers Luis Casillas and Isaac Ibarra were dispatched to the scene and ordered Martinez to drop his weapon or he would be shot. When Martinez “separated one of his hands from the shotgun,” the officers opened fire…