NYPD officers fatally shoot man with large knife in Queens, police say (2025)

The New York City Police Department says officers fatally shot a man carrying a 14-inch knife early Monday in Astoria, Queens.

Police said they received three 911 calls around 6:20 a.m. about a man with a knife acting erratically on 30th Street near 31st Avenue. Some witnesses said they were worried he might stab someone, according to police.

"Uniformed members of the 114th quickly responded within minutes and confronted a person in the street holding a large knife," NYPD Chief of Department John Chell told reporters later in the morning.

Chell said the officers spoke with the 61-year-old man for nearly a minute and deployed multiple stun guns before shots were fired.

"At this point, the man advanced himself on one of the officers, they were forced to defend themselves," he said.

"You could hear a lot of commotion," Astoria resident Andres Lopez said. "It was kind of like fireworks."

The man was treated on the scene before being taken to Elmhurst Hospital, where he died of his injuries.

The officers were not hurt, but they were also taken to the hospital to be checked for tinnitus.

Man had previous mental health incidents, Chell says

Chell said the man had "two documented incidents of mental disorder" with the police department. Police sources say they were two non-criminal encounters in which he was hospitalized.

"Any time the NYPD interacts with anyone in distress, we attempt to slow down and deescalate the situation, with the ultimate goal of getting them the help they need. However, during fast-moving and hectic situations with an armed person, we are forced to defend ourselves," Chell said in his opening remarks.

He said the situation was captured on the officers' body-worn cameras and on a nearby surveillance camera.

Police say they're looking into exactly why the stun guns were ineffective during the incident. According to the most recent NYPD use of force report, of nearly 1,500 incidents in which stun guns were discharged in 2023, roughly 34% were ineffective, most likely due to "such circumstances as the probes falling out of the subject, the subject fighting through the pain, probes being too far back from the surface area, or the probes missing the subject."

The scene was located underneath the elevated subway lines in the area, but service was not impacted.

There were more than a dozen cups marking where shell casings may have fallen. Detectives could be seen taking photographs and canvassing for video, while the Crime Scene Unit bagged evidence.

Anyone with information about the case is asked to call the NYPD's Crime Stoppers hotline at 1-800-577-TIPS (8477), or 1-888-57-PISTA (74782) for Spanish. You can also submit a tipvia their website.

In:
• Queens
• NYPD
• Astoria