Brooklyn police shot allegedly knife-wielding man dead following apartment standoff, NYPD says

Chaos unfolded on a Brooklyn street Friday after police fatally shot a man who allegedly charged at them with a knife.

Members of the NYPD Warrant Squad entered a home at 478 East 21st St. in Flatbush at around 5:20 p.m. on Sept. 13 where, according to Chief of Department Jeffrey Maddrey, the knife-wielding man confronted them.

Maddrey reported that police had been looking for the man after he was identified as a person of interest in several unsolved homicides during the summer. Thirty-eight-year-old Vilmond Jean Baptiste allegedly did not want to comply with police and instead hunkered down in the bathroom’s tub.

Moments later, authorities said, the man emerged while still carrying a knife and allegedly charged at officers — who then shot him multiple times.

“They get to a rear bathroom, where they observe a male, fully dressed in hooded sweatshirt, hiding in the bathtub. The members from the warrant squad gave numerous commands to the male. They gave commands to get out of the tub, to show his hands, and then they realized that he was armed with the knife,” Chief Maddrey said. “The sergeant on the scene tried to deploy the taser, but the Taser did not work.”

Maddrey declared it was at this time Baptiste allegedly charged at cops, three of whom shot him an indeterminate amount of times. The man was pronounced dead at a hospital a short time later, police said.

Lifting a taser, Deputy Commissioner of Operations Kaz Daughtry said that when the shock device did not work the commanding officer on scene attempted deploy it again, and in doing so, came close to being stabbed.

“The sergeant then tried to take out another cartridge to insert into the taser when the suspect came out of the bathroom with a knife and almost attempted to stab our sergeant. The officers were forced to use deadly physical force to take the suspect down,” Daughtry said.

Unsure of what had taken place, law enforcement sources said, locals began throwing objects at officers on street level from surrounding apartments, hitting one cop in the head and causing minor injuries. At least one arrest was made.

Baptiste had one prior arrest in 2015 for reckless endangerment but also had an active bench warrant. He was a “strong” person of interest in three deadly stabbings dating back to July in Brooklyn that left left a 54-year-old woman, a 66-year-old woman, and a 24-year-old man dead.

“His MO seems to be he begins to date older women, and then they allow him to reside in his house to use narcotics,” Chief of Detectives Joseph Kenny said.

Police asked the public to avoid the area as the investigation continues. 

The police-involved shooting happened in the wake of an NYPD shakeup Thursday, after Edward Caban resigned the post amid an ongoing federal investigation. Mayor Eric Adams moved quickly to name Tom Donlin the interim commissioner.