the Attorney General's office is continuing its investigation into the Fatal police shooting of a Jersey City man who was experiencing a mental health crisis law enforcement authorities say the man a 52-year-old Andrew Jerome Washington charged at the officers with a knife before they deployed a taser and a firearm City officials say his death is tragic but maintained police followed proper protocol Advocates are now arguing the family deserves more transparency and accountability senior correspondent Joanna gagas has the story we've failed as a whole because there was a casualty city leaders and community members are coming to terms with the death of 52-year-old Jersey City resident Andrew Jerome Washington on Sunday afternoon he was shot by police responding to Washington who was in a mental health crisis I think we failed on multiple fronts because we failed to provide the Jersey City police department with everything um that would have been necessary to you know not see this event happen and then subsequently we failed the community we fell a community of mentally impaired or mentally uh Disturbed people by not providing services that they need councilman Frank Gilmore says a program was approved by the city council in 2022 that would send mental health professionals out on these crisis response calls alongside police officers but to date there's been no progress on that initiative Community groups like New Jersey together have been pushing the administration to move it forward when you have someone who's agitated who's fearful if a SWAT team shows up you're you're absolutely escalating that situation and certainly it's a dangerous situation and you want people to be safe but the first course of action should be to de-escalate that person and mental health professionals are trained to come in and calm that person down talk to them about if they have a weapon on them releasing that weapon and having a conversation in Washington's case his family says he'd stop taking his medication for bipolar disorder and schizophrenia and he was wielding a knife according to the Attorney General's office which is investigating the shooting Emergency Medical Services arrived at Washington's residence first at 2 15 then called The Jersey City police who arrived at 2 30 PM they called for the Jersey City Emergency Services Unit at almost three and by 3 30 PM the special unit forced opened the door saw Washington Advance toward them with a knife and fired two deadly rounds obviously this is not just a problem in Jersey City we've seen it happen in Patterson recently where a young man lost his life we really need to have a better approach to this these situations should not end in a dash there are ways to talk to people who are upset there are correct ways to calm the situation and respond in a way that's much more compassionate but the city says their response was appropriate and emulated the model this new program would have used Emergency Medical Services were there with police and they say police body camera footage will show that Washington charged police aggressively with a knife before deadly force was used the Jersey Medical Center that had a great deal of familiarity with him as well arrived at the scene first and they're the ones that contacted the Jersey Police Department because they felt unsafe I'm trained myself I'm an emergency psychiatric technician also I've reviewed everything they did and they attempted to establish Rapport they attempted to find family members who could speak to him unsuccessfully they asked him if he'd rather speak to Medical people they asked they tried to find other officers who might have had a previous relation with him but the officer himself spoke compassionately spoke caringly to him constantly reassured him that we were only there to make sure he was okay family and community members are waiting for the body camera footage to be released so they can better understand what transpired here meanwhile they're holding a vigil here tonight in honor of Washington in Jersey City I'm Joanna gagis NJ Spotlight news [Music]