Miami detectives identify 34-year-old man fatally shot by officer

MIAMI – Detectives identified the man an officer shot and killed on Tuesday in Miami as Antwon Leonard Cooper. He would have celebrated his 35th birthday next month.

Videos from a surveillance camera at the nearby Miami Northwestern Senior High School and the officers’ body cameras are part of the investigation, police said.

During a news conference on Tuesday night, Miami Chief Manny Morales said the Miami police officer shot and killed a man during a traffic stop at the intersection of Northwest 71st Street and Northwest 10th Avenue.

“Officers became aware that one of the individuals was armed. A struggle ensued and one of the officers discharged his firearm,” Morales said during the news conference.

The department released his identity on Wednesday, several hours after Miami crime scene investigators left markings with pink neon spray paint on the school zone area where the shooting happened.

Cooper was a convicted felon. In 2006, a Miami-Dade County jury found him guilty of armed burglary, conspiracy to commit a home invasion robbery, and threat to use a firearm, records show. A judge sentenced him to seven years in prison. According to the Florida Department of Corrections, he was released from prison on March 1, 2011.

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About nine months after his release, Cooper was arrested for cocaine possession with the intent to sell, records show. Cooper was also arrested in Miami-Dade for marijuana possession in 2012, armed robbery in 2014, possession of a controlled substance in 2019, and petit theft last year, according to court records. He had a trial hearing scheduled for April 11.

On Tuesday, during the traffic stop and his last encounter with police, Cooper was with another man inside a burgundy four-door car, police said. Officers arrested the man who survived the shooting. A white tarp covered Cooper’s body on the road well into the night. The department did not release the identity of the witness in custody.

Morales said the officer involved in the shooting was not injured and was on administrative leave. He also didn’t release the officer’s identity. The Florida Department of Law Enforcement is investigating the shooting.

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