‘He tried to kill me’: Police share body cam video in armed NJ man’s shooting death

🔺 Body camera footage shows NJ man armed with knife

🔺 Man was advancing on woman in stairwell, video shows

🔺 An officer fired one fatal shot, which is now under review

Footage from police body-worn cameras and the recording of an emergency call released Monday by the state show a tense scene before a 42-year-old armed man’s shooting death in Elizabeth.

Estiben Alegria-Hurtado, an Elizabeth resident, was raising a knife and advancing toward a screaming woman in a stairwell when he was shot once by a responding officer the morning of July 29.

Alegria-Hurtado was pronounced dead late the following night at a local hospital.

No one else was reported hurt in the encounter.

The officer who fired has been identified as Elizabeth Police Officer Steven Lazo.

Elizabeth police responded to 911 calls on July 29 around 8 a.m. about a fight and an unwanted individual at a multifamily residence on Amity Street.

In redacted audio from one such call, a woman says "I've got this guy, he's drunk, he's banging on my door."

Family members previously told ABC Eyewitness News that Alegria-Hurtado had shown up drunk to his cousin's house and went to knock on the door of an acquaintance upstairs.

Body cam footage shows officers heard shouting as they arrived at the home and once inside, saw two men trying to restrain Alegria-Hurtado, who was holding a kitchen knife.

Within five minutes, as the officers walked toward Alegria-Hurtado, he struggled free while raising his right arm with the knife. He stepped through a door, toward a woman in a rear stairwell.

Officer Lazo fired once, hitting Alegria-Hurtado — who then slumps back and to the floor as the woman can be heard shouting, “He tried to kill me!”

The knife was recovered from his side and officers gave first aid to Algeria-Hurtado before he was taken to University Hospital in Newark.

He was pronounced dead at 11:26 p.m. on July 30.

The investigation has remained ongoing — including the standard review by the state Attorney General’s Office of all police-involved shootings.

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