SEATTLE — The mother of a man fatally wounded by police in Portland said she was on the phone with her son when it happened.
Antoinette Cisneros told KING-TV in Seattle that her son spoke his final words to her and then she heard gunfire.
“I heard everything until the time he was killed,” Cisneros told the television station.
Police said Santiago A. Cisneros III, 32, had a shotgun and fired at them when they encountered him on a parking lot roof in northeast Portland on the night of March 4. Officers said they returned fire.
Cisneros died at a Portland hospital. No officers were injured.
He was an Iraq War veteran who had talked about the challenges of post-traumatic stress disorder. Cisneros lived in Seattle but was visiting family in Portland last week.
His mother said she called him late Monday night but didn’t know where he was at the time. She later learned he was driving up a Portland parking garage.
Moments later, he told her on the phone that he loved her and stepped out of the car, she said.
“He said, ‘Forgive me, mom. Mom, I love you. I love you, mom.’ And I said, ‘Mijo, don’t leave, don’t go away. I hear you going away from the car,’ ” Antoinette Cisneros told KING-TV.
Soon she heard gunfire, followed by another man’s voice.
“He said, ‘Stop,’ ” she recalled. “And then I heard him again say, ‘Stop.’ “
Portland police said the shooting unfolded quickly after Santiago Cisneros approached the two officers.
“Within seconds, they’re confronted by this guy with a shotgun, and shots were fired,” police spokesman Sgt. Pete Simpson said last week. “The officers returned fire and knocked him to the ground.”
The two officers involved are on paid administrative leave until a grand jury completes an inquiry.
Antoinette Cisneros said she wants people to hold their judgment until an investigation is done.
