Man killed by officer had only one other ‘strange’ contact with SPPD
April 14, 2017
By Peggy Kelly
Santa Paula News
The identity of the man shot and killed by Santa Paula Police early Sunday has been released.
Santa Paula resident Jose Gonzalez Rendon, 36, died of gunshot wounds Sunday at about 6:30 a.m. after SPPD Officers responded to reports of a man with a large kitchen knife in the 100 block of East Ventura Street near Palm Avenue.
Witnesses reported hearing four or five shots at the time the incident occurred.
Rendon was pronounced dead at the scene. None of the three responding officers were injured in the incident.
According to SPPD Sgt. Cody Madison, Rendon was virtually unknown to local police expect for a “strange” April 2016 incident.
“We’ve had just one prior contact in the past for vehicle tampering,” that Madison said occurred April 14, 2016 outside City Hall.
At 1:38 p.m. a “Detective was sitting in an unmarked car with the engine running, listening to the radio and he suddenly realized someone was trying to open the back door of the vehicle.”
Rendon was arrested without incident: “It was just unusual and due to the nature of it there was a suspicion of a mental health issue,” that Madison indicated could have been a factor in Sunday’s shooting.
“You don’t,” he noted, “approach a police officer with a knife…”
It is standard procedure in such cases for an outside agency, in this case the Ventura County Sheriff’s Office, to investigate the incident.
The name of the officer involved will not be released until later Thursday afternoon or Friday morning, past the Santa Paula Time’s press deadline for the April 14 edition.
When police do release the identity of the officer, it will be posted online on the Santa Paula Times website, www.santapaulatimes.com
There has been one other fatal officer-involved shooting in Santa Paula that occurred in July 2012 when a man was killed after he fired on officers, striking one officer in the belt buckle. Officers had already been called to his parents’ residence several times that same day for reports of violence against a family member.
