Teen girl holding knife shot and killed by officers, Anchorage police say

A 16-year-old girl was shot and killed by Anchorage police officers responding to a report of a domestic disturbance in East Anchorage late Tuesday, police said. She was holding a knife and did not obey commands to drop it, police said.

Family members on Wednesday identified the girl as Easter Leafa, who they said had arrived in Alaska from American Samoa earlier this year.

She turned 16 in June. A video on Facebook showed her celebrating with family members and a cake with sprinkles.

Leafa is the sixth person to be shot by Anchorage police since mid-May, and the fourth person to be killed. It’s a spate of police shootings unmatched anytime in recent city history.

According to the police account of events, officers received a report of a disturbance involving family members at the Greenbriar apartment complex on the 4800 block of East 43rd Avenue off Tudor Road just after 11:30 p.m. Tuesday.

A 911 caller said her sister was threatening her with a knife, Anchorage police chief Sean Case said at a news conference streamed on social media Wednesday morning. Officers who entered the involved apartment “gave the subject some commands,” he said. “The subject approached them while still holding the knife,” he said.

One officer then fired multiple rounds and a second officer fired a less-than-lethal 40 mm projectile, Case said.

The officers have not yet been identified.

Leafa was struck in the upper and lower body, police said. Officers provided “medical support” and the wounded teen was brought to an Anchorage hospital, where she was declared dead, Case said.

No one else was injured, police said.

The shooting was met by a swell of disbelief and anguish on social media and questions from Anchorage city leaders about the mounting death toll of police shootings.

“This is a tragic incident, there’s no other way to describe it,” Case said at the news conference. “As police officers, we strive to protect human life. And when we don’t meet that goal, there’s no other way to describe it than it’s tragic.”

Anchorage Mayor Suzanne LaFrance said in a statement that the public, and the family, needed more information about what happened.

“My heart goes out to the family that is grieving as a result of last night’s incident,” said Mayor Suzanne LaFrance in a statement. “The loss of a child is devastating and 16 is too young to leave this world. Last night we lost a member of our community, and we grieve together with the family.”

“We all have a right — and a need — to understand what happened last night,” LaFrance wrote. “Everyone deserves to feel safe in our community and transparency and trust in law enforcement are paramount to that.”

Anchorage Assembly member Daniel Volland wrote to Case asking about the police’s deescalation efforts.

“I am shocked to see this string of officer killings continue,” he wrote. “What education in deescalation is happening in your department? Does the Assembly need to fund special training?”

He said he hadn’t received a response from the department as of Wednesday evening.

[An overview of Anchorage police shootings in 2024]

The shooting unfolded in a second-floor apartment at a large complex just off Tudor Road, east of the Alaska Native Tribal Health Consortium complex.

Leafa moved to Alaska just months ago from American Samoa, her sister said in an interview with Alaska’s News Source that was livestreamed by a family member and widely shared on social media. By Thursday morning, it had been viewed nearly 450,000 times.

She spent most of her time with family, her sisters said. She was still learning English, they said.

Her family members described police showing up at the apartment, and a series of events that quickly escalated into gunfire by police. The police, Leafa’s sisters said, didn’t know her name or that there were multiple other children in the apartment. They say they tried to ask police if they could speak with Leafa to calm her down, but were told no.

“You could talk to her,” one said. “She will drop it. She will be back to herself any minute.”

One sister said she witnessed what happened next: Leafa was holding the knife, but not pointing it at police, she said. She was asked to put it down and made a “tiny little movement,” her sister said. “They shot her three times.”

Leafa didn’t understand what was happening, the family members said. They asked why she couldn’t have been shocked with a Taser to drop the knife.

“She just moved here. It’s very different here from back home in how the system works here. So with them coming at her like that, and shot her like that, it’s very heartbreaking,” her sister said in the livestream.

Family members said they want to see the full body camera footage.

The involved officers had not been interviewed as of Wednesday morning, Case said. He said he couldn’t speak to their individual decisions to use deadly or less-lethal force.

“Typically our training does involve when you have a less lethal projectile or any sort of less lethal tool, like a Taser for instance, that we always have lethal with that officer,” Case said. “So you’ll see an officer that will have a handgun or a rifle or some sort of lethal projectile as well as a less-than-lethal at the same time. And each officer is making a determination to use the tool that they have with them based on the circumstances in front of them.”

Leafa would have started her junior year of high school at Bettye Davis East Anchorage High School this week.

“She was a 16-year-old who came to the U.S. looking for a good school and a future, and now she’s gone,” her sister said.