Army veteran Jeremy Taylor Culp, 32, was shot and killed Tuesday by police in Orange, Texas, after leading authorities on a high-speed chase. (Claybar Funeral Home/Facebook)
AUSTIN, Texas — An Army veteran who was killed last month by police after a high-speed car chase had 25 gunshot wounds in his head, arms, legs and torso, according to an autopsy report.
Jeremy Culp, 32, was shot by police after the armed veteran crashed his truck and attempted to surrender to authorities. His death is considered a homicide, according to Forensic Medical of Texas, which performed the autopsy at the request of Hershel Stagner, a justice of the peace in Orange County, where the incident took place.
The toxicology results requested as part of the autopsy remain pending, according to the one-page report.
Culp, who deployed to Afghanistan in 2012 with the 82nd Airborne Division, had been diagnosed with post-traumatic stress disorder and traumatic brain injury from his service. Though he initially struggled to return to civilian life, his family said he had been doing well managing his symptoms in recent years.
However, Culp woke up Oct. 15 clearly agitated and hypervigilant. Neighbors in Bridge City, where Culp lived, called police after he fired shots from inside his home and at other homes. He left the area in his white truck and hit a police officer on a motorcycle as he crossed a narrow bridge.
Police from five agencies were on scene when Culp crashed his truck near a middle school in Orange, roughly 9 miles from his home in southeast Texas. Video recorded by a bystander of the encounter shows Culp exit his truck with a semiautomatic rifle, lay the weapon down and then lie on his stomach.
Officials said the veteran then reached back for the weapon, so police opened fire. The video is unclear of what exactly happened in that moment.
Police have not said how many officers were involved or how many rounds were fired. Channel 12 News in Beaumont reported at least five officers from three agencies were placed on leave after the shooting.
Daren Johns, the Army veteran’s uncle, said 25 shots “seem really excessive,” and he would like to see video taken through body-worn cameras of police officers on the scene.
The Orange Police Department denied a request to release the footage citing the ongoing investigation. The Texas Department of Public Safety also denied a request for video footage collected by state police at the scene. The decision on whether to release the footage sits with the Attorney General’s Office.
Michael Sierra-Arévalo, a professor in the Department of Sociology at the University of Texas at Austin, said it is not new to see police fire dozens of rounds during such an incident, even in instances where the person is not armed.
“Keep in mind, 25 wounds would strongly suggest that officers fired many more than 25 shots because most of the shots fired by officers in the U.S. do not hit their intended target,” said Sierra-Arévalo, who wrote the book “The Danger Imperative,” which looks at police culture and the use of violence.
Even if body-camera video shows Culp did not reach for his weapon, it might not make a difference in whether any officers could be held criminally liable for Culp’s death, he said.
“It’s going to be difficult, barring some very clear evidence that a reasonable officer would not have perceived that Mr. Culp was reaching for his firearm or had a firearm in his possession, not to find the shooting reasonable,” Sierra-Arévalo said.
Past cases have shown the standard of reasonable to be wide ranging and open to an officer’s perception of a threat rather than an actual threat, he said.
The investigation into Culp’s death remains open with the Texas Rangers, a state police force that often investigates police involved shootings across the state. The agency did not respond Wednesday with an update on the investigation.
