A photo provided by the San Antonio Police Department shows Sgt. Alfred Flores and Officers Eleazar Alejandro and Nathaniel Villalobos, who have been charged with the murder of San Antonio resident Melissa Perez.
While inside her apartment, police video shows, Perez argued with the officers outside. She threw a glass candlestick toward an officer on the other side of an open window. Then, Perez, while still inside her home, grabbed a hammer and swung it toward the officers outside. Three officers, Sgt. Alfred Flores and Officers Eleazar Alejandro and Nathaniel Villalobos, shot into her apartment, hitting her at least twice. Within 24 hours, each officer was charged with murder.
“For as long as I’ve been practicing law, which is over 35 years, they’ve had a problem in dealing with persons that are exhibiting psychiatric symptoms,” he said. “Far too many of them wind up dead, either because of unlawful restraints or because they are, like Ms. Perez, killed when there is no justification for it.”
The police department received 54,932 mental health calls from January 2019 to April 2021, according to a 2021 report by the Meadows Mental Health Policy Institute, which issued a mixed assessment of the department’s record. San Antonio also has a year-old program that sends a mental health clinician and a paramedic — in addition to a police officer — to respond to mental health 911 calls made within its specific service area.
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