It appears that the gentleman has a sable by both hands.  I had always known that between a sable and a pistol.  The pistol is way above dominance. In any situation where whether it is the police or a home invasion, the first reaction of a residence is to protect his home.  Such shooting without the person being 

requested to put down the gun is total brutality

I know of a case in Miami, when a crazed patient from a psychiatric hospital that was sent to the United States during the Mariel Boatlift was shot to death by the police when the man was holding a machete.  Given that the policeman had dominance with a pistol at a great distance from the man, the shooting was declared unnecessary. This looks very similar to that situation. Police are taking abuse of authority more and more when they are associated with people that are related to drugs. Imagine that the police would have made an error and raided the wrong house.  A  totally innocent person would have been shoot to death unnecessarily.

It was the wrong person.The house was supposed to be empty.This is exactly the kind of cowboy justice that these SWAT teams bring with them every time they do a SWAT style raid.They are pumped up with adrenalin and ready to kill at the first sign of aggression without mercy.They shot the man in the head.That says it all.If this was justified then no one is safe in Utah.Using drugs is obviously a capital offence to be dispensed without trial.A golf club against an armored armed police officer.Ya,that justifies it alright.

There isn't any hesitation at all- he just points, shoots, and keeps going. They actually look like they are playing a game of paintball or some other nonlethal war game. Sickening!!!

Utterly horrifying.  He was just freaked out and trying to protect himself from someone trying to kick down his door.  And with a GOLF CLUB.   The most innocuous weapon in possible.  Just disgusting. 

I wonder what that officer would think if it were his wife or son shot by a fellow officer serving a warrant?

       Can anyone react fast enough to avoid being shot by testosterone driven  aggression such as this ?  Gee, think there were enough cops there ? Nobody even gives the guy a second look as they pass by looking for someone else to ' take down'.The problem is that every small town in the country is told and 'sold' on the idea of the necessity of  their own  SWAT style  Drug Enforcement Unit. Lots of money to be made ; by the suppliers of SWAT equipment, by confiscation of seized property, by more cops on the beat and the overtime they can rack up. Then the local gov't  budget gets inflated from all these "enforcement costs" and the expense is passed on to the TAXPAYERS.  When will people get wise.

P.S. I forgot another link in the chain---The Prison Industrial Complex---the private for-profit corrections corporations --got to keep them fed too.  SLOGAN  --  Build Prisons not Schools !!

This is as ignorant and brutal as it gets. Justified my ass. Are people blind? This man was innocent! dirty stinking lousy cops! Is it any wonder people are afraid of the police. There was no need to shoot this man. But hey who am i to critique when my own fine police officers of Fort Smith AR shot and killed a guy who had a BB gun. This guy was mentally disabled also. That was justified also.

I had to see the video a number of times. It was difficult for my mind to accept and digest. I made myself sick when watching  the video. This could happen to absolutely anyone. I am posting it on my web site http://www.greenribbonworld.com. As Ganja Granny I keep preaching peaceful civility, hoping to remove the stigma attached to cannabis use. I keep saying we are not at war... After seeing this brutal murder carried out with what appears to be a bunch of untrained  gung ho cops... I am thinking We are at war!I also think that everyone in law enforcement should be evaluated psychologically before being accepted and given frequent check ups there after for as long as they are employed. The prohibition laws and the way they are enforced have made serious criminals out of many people on both sides of the law. How can something so obviously wrong be considered justified? 

I con't think my comment is necessary because the reality has been enacted so many times the agenda that drives it is crystal clear.  The "war on drugs" is a well-funded and tragic experiment in judicial corruption, a laboratory designed to explore the limits of what a government can get away iwth not only without consequences but with the approal of the very citizens who are directly and indirectly the victims of modern-day fascism.  The racist component is very clear but the hysteria is so virulent that color often is not a requirement for the type of frontier justice those armed-to-the-teeth gestapo bastards glory in.  Defining who is "them" and who is "us" is a totalitarian political tool that has served repressive governments for generations both here and abroad and the present economic climate is one of the main nutrients in this horrific Petri dish

I con't think my comment is necessary because the reality has been enacted so many times the agenda that drives it is crystal clear.  The "war on drugs" is a well-funded and tragic experiment in judicial corruption, a laboratory designed to explore the limits of what a government can get away iwth not only without consequences but with the approal of the very citizens who are directly and indirectly the victims of modern-day fascism.  The racist component is very clear but the hysteria is so virulent that color often is not a requirement for the type of frontier justice those armed-to-the-teeth gestapo bastards glory in.  Defining who is "them" and who is "us" is a totalitarian political tool that has served repressive governments for generations both here and abroad and the present economic climate is one of the main nutrients in this horrific Petri dish

i'm not justifying this shooting, however if you think about it,, a golf club to the head of ANYONE will result in severe head trauma if not death.

the cop should have yelled for him to drop the golf club, and allow that to happen, before just shooting in such a hurry.

I fear the law more nowadays than i do any criminal.. When i watched this video , i really couldn't believe what i was watching...besically this cop murdered a man after breaking into his home.  I don't care about the semantics , or the search warrant , yadda yadda...this cop murdered a man who simply reacted in the matter any person would when a group of cops breaks down your door. This cop did not hesitate for a second before shooting him. The cops might be the instrument of the law but they are not the judge and jury...that cop did not have a right to carry out a death sentence on this man. What i found even more unbelievable than the video itself is the fact that the Utah authorities deemed it to be a justifiable shooting. Are you serious??? What kind of monkies do they have making decisions out there ....All i can say is it was murder , straight up and down and the authorities are just covering for the actions of the police...which make them just as bad if not worse. I hope the soulless cop that shot this poor man suffers the rest of his life for it. It is frightening to think that guy is still running around with a badge and a gun.

They were yelling POLICE - SEARCH WARRANT - LOUD.  That man KNEW damn well that was the police.  Standing with something that very easily can be mistaken for a weapon like a shotgun is D U M B.  The idiot either WANTED to die or was just plain STUPID.  I cannot blame police for that.  They don't have the time to stand around trying to figure out if the man has a golf club or a much more dangerous weapon.  They have to worry about their own lives too.

Sorry - I many times fall on the non-law enforcement side on things like this, but not on this one guys.

Keep in mind, that you are innocent til proven guilty. This person, regardless of past issues with the law, is still a citizen with all rights afforded to them as a citizen.

With that said, I am tired of ordinary citizens of this great country being held to higher standard than our "well trained law enforcement" people. If you were to address a similar assault on your person with deadly force through the use of a firearm, you will be charged-PERIOD! End of story. I support law enforcement, but this stuff can't and should never happen. There is a ZERO tolerance by law enforcement, when it come to a citizen protecting themselves  through the of a firearm, but an almost "IN YOUR FACE" policy of ignoring or burying stuff like this, when it happens to someone in law enforcement. You can't just kick in the door of anyones home, waking them up out of a sound sleep and expect them to automatically think that its the police, and then expect them assume the position.

That officer should have never been assigned to SWAT. Obviously the standards are pretty low in that department. No one will ever convince otherwise of this. I have been a DOORKICKER and I can tell you that through training, you ONLY look at the persons hands, and then assess the threat. Using appropriate force the combat threat. I for one will hold law enforcement to a higher standard. You should too.

Do a quick search and see how many times search warrants have been issued to wrong addresses, or the police screwed up and it resulted in the death of a home owner. A father, a husband woken up in the middle of the night from a sound sleep, scared and attempting to protect his family, only to be shot to death. It could be you next. It makes me sick to think that people will excuse this. One lunatic in AZ  goes off, and the entire congress wants to disarm the country, but no one is drawing up legislation when a 7 year old child is shot in one of these search warrants by police. Wake up people. There is an imbalance of accountability here that should not be ignored.

Looks like the officer made a bad decision that cost a man his life.

"Because they had expected to raid an empty residence, the police SWAT team had not prepared a "dynamic entry" plan."

Maybe the dept. should start treating every raid seriously and take the right measures instead of putting their officers and civilians in a positions like that.

They saw a man with a weapon and made a split second decision to stop him. Perhaps they could have aimed at his legs or arms instead of his head but I'm no officer so I do not know how they're trained.

So in other words, if ANYONE breaks in your home its better to shoot first and ask questions later as the police are more likely to kill you than a criminal. Next person through my door without a key dies, cop or not.

JUST ANOTHER STORY OF AN AMERICAN BEING MURDERED BY A PARA MILITARY STORM TROOPERS. THE MAN WAS HOLDING A GOLF CLUB AND DIDN'T EVEN COME AT THEM. I AM SURE THAT THERE WAS NO WAY TO DEFEND FROM A GOLF CLUB AND SO THEY MURDERED HIM. NOTHING NEW. JUST LAST WEEK A MARINE WAS MURDERED BY PIMA COUNTY SWAT IN AZ. THEY SHOT HIM 60 TIMES AFTER ONE OF THE ASS HOLE SWAT GUYS FELL OVER HIS OWN FEET AND THEY ASSUMED HE HAD BEEN SHOT.  BA  FEVF

JUST ANOTHER STORY OF AN AMERICAN BEING MURDERED BY A PARA MILITARY STORM TROOPERS. THE MAN WAS HOLDING A GOLF CLUB AND DIDN'T EVEN COME AT THEM. I AM SURE THAT THERE WAS NO WAY TO DEFEND FROM A GOLF CLUB AND SO THEY MURDERED HIM. THE OFFICER TELLS HIM TO GET ON THE GROUND AFTER KILLING HIM.  NOTHING NEW. JUST LAST WEEK A MARINE WAS MURDERED BY PIMA COUNTY SWAT IN AZ. THEY SHOT HIM 60 TIMES AFTER ONE OF THE ASS HOLE SWAT GUYS FELL OVER HIS OWN FEET AND THEY ASSUMED HE HAD BEEN SHOT. 

I would have shot and I believe the majority of these Monday morning Qbacks would have too.The cop had probably less than one second to decide whether or not to fire.The fella looked like he was holding a pistol in a two handed stance. When I slowed it down and played it the guy looked like he was holding a sword. They went in on a Meth raid. These people are maniacs. There are hundreds of them in my county.... They are in their 20s and 30s and look like 60 yr. old zombees with aids. They are violent too. I worked with one a few years back that bragged about stabbing his stepson to death. He bragged every day for a month until he burned himself ,his girl friend,and her 2 kids to death in a trailer fire. He was not cooking it at the time but his chemicals caught fire.As hard as you whine it does not make these people saints...BTW I am not a LE officer either...If this looser had not have been able to post bail on his stepsons murder...there might be a woman  and her two 2 year olds alive right now.  She borrowed money from her mom and dad to get him out. Her mom had to sneak her dads guns out and pawn them because he just sits around and talks about killing himself. now.

  You could pick a lot better cause to whine about the police about than these kind of people.