Documents: Suicidal man shot by police had pellet gun

A reportedly suicidal man shot by Spokane Valley police Friday was armed with a pellet gun that resembles a Colt .45 semi-automatic pistol, newly filed documents show. David J. Glidden, 27, was shot twice in the upper body after emerging from a Spokane Valley home armed with the Airsoft pellet pistol. Officer Aaron Childress fired a handgun and Officer Griffin Criswell fired a 12-gauge shotgun at him. Some of those rounds went through the wall of a neighbor’s home. Glidden, who is in stable but serious condition at a local hospital, had just exited a home at 4727 E. Third Ave., where he’d been living for only a few days after breaking up with his girlfriend, a friend told detectives. Glidden was home alone at the time of the shooting; he’d called a friend he met through Alcoholics Anonymous and threatened suicide, according to a search warrant filed today in Spokane County District Court. “(Glidden) said he was ‘going to kill somebody or kill himself,’” according to the warrant. That warrant was used to search the home, where police seized seven empty Budweiser cans, according to the document. The man told his friend he’d been drinking when he first called about 7 a.m. When the man called again about four hours later, his “attitude had changed significantly,” according to the search warrant. “He told (his friend) he had the gun in his hand and was cocking it,” according to the warrant. “(His friend) could hear the sound of what he thought was a gun being cocked.” Childress was near the southwest corner of the residence, and Criswell near the southeast corner when they fired shots, according to documents. Investigators found three spent .45-caliber shell casings and one spent shotgun shell casing. A neighbor said last week that he heard five shots and that rounds blew through a side wall of his home. Childress and Criswell have more than 10 years of law enforcement experience, police said.