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Tedman Werito

Age : 44

Gender : Male

Race : Native American

Date : 09/13/2021

Location : County Road 3935, Wildflower area

City : Farmington

County : San Juan

State : New Mexico

Agency : San Juan County Sheriff’s Office

Officer(s) :Not Disclosed

Cause of Death : Gunshot

Event : Killed by police during SWAT barricade and warrant service

OPEN RECORDS SUMMARY :

On 09/13/2021, five San Juan County Sheriff’s Office deputies shot and killed 44-year-old Tedman Werito following an approximately two-hour warrant service and SWAT barricade at his residence on County Road 3935 in the Wildflower area outside Farmington.
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The police operation began with a separate incident at approximately 1:33 a.m., when Farmington police encountered a severely injured woman near Dustin Road and Almon Street. Investigators said the woman had been beaten with a bat at a residence and had jumped from a moving pickup truck. She was hospitalized with substantial blood loss and a broken femur that required surgery.
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Police determined that the assault allegedly occurred at the County Road 3935 residence where Werito lived. The San Juan County Sheriff’s Office subsequently obtained a search warrant for the property. Deputies also knew that Werito had three outstanding warrants involving aggravated assault, battery and possession of a controlled substance.
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Deputies arrived at approximately 9:06 a.m. and used a loudspeaker to order the people inside to come out. Six people, including Werito, initially exited the residence.
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According to the Sheriff’s Office, Werito made verbal threats toward deputies and then went back inside, telling deputies he was retrieving a firearm. Deputies continued attempting to persuade him to surrender.
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The San Juan County SWAT team arrived with an armored vehicle at approximately 10:20 a.m. Police alleged that Werito repeatedly moved in and out of the residence while holding a firearm. Deputies continued giving commands for him to surrender.
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Police also alleged that Werito threw what appeared to be a grenade toward deputies. The device was subsequently examined and determined to be inert.
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SWAT deputies deployed two flash-bang devices in an attempt to force Werito from the residence. When those were unsuccessful, deputies introduced tear gas into the house.
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At approximately 10:57 a.m., Werito came out of the residence. The Sheriff's Office alleged that he pointed a firearm toward deputies. Five deputies then simultaneously or nearly simultaneously opened fire, killing him.
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Body-worn-camera footage subsequently released by the San Juan County Sheriff’s Office provides significant independent visual evidence of the final confrontation. The recording shows portions of the prolonged standoff and the final moments in which Werito emerged from the residence before five deputies fired. The Sheriff's Office released the footage publicly in October 2021.
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The existence of that video is important because this case is not dependent solely upon written officer statements. The publicly released footage permits direct examination of substantial portions of the encounter and was cited in later reporting as showing Werito emerging with a gun pointed toward deputies.
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The San Juan County Regional Officer Involved Shooting Task Force investigated the killing. Importantly, the San Juan County Sheriff's Office did not serve as the primary investigative agency for its own deputies' shooting. Farmington Police Department was designated the primary investigating agency.
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The publicly accessible reporting located for this update does not identify the five deputies who fired. This is a significant remaining gap in the record because five separate law-enforcement officers used deadly force, yet their identities were not disclosed in the contemporary accounts or subsequent body-camera coverage located during this review.
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Identification of all five shooting deputies is particularly important for this database because each deputy should be individually checked for previous shootings, use-of-force incidents, complaints, discipline and civil-rights litigation. The complete Farmington Police Department task-force investigation, administrative records and district-attorney review may contain those identities even though they did not appear in the public news coverage.
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OFFICER BACKGROUND
Five San Juan County Sheriff’s Office deputies fired at Tedman Werito. Their names have not been publicly identified in the records located for this update.
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The San Juan County Sheriff's Office had another highly significant fatal shooting only two months before Werito's death. On 07/17/2021, Deputy Jon Gonzales shot and killed 36-year-old Shawn Marvin Thomas near Shiprock after a police pursuit.
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That earlier shooting became the subject of wrongful-death litigation. Thomas's family alleged that Gonzales used excessive force and that Thomas was unarmed when Gonzales shot him. The Sheriff's Office initially reported that civilians and Gonzales had seen Thomas with a weapon, but investigators did not recover a firearm after the shooting. The agency subsequently suggested that Thomas may have possessed a replica gun that was destroyed when his vehicle caught fire.
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Thomas's mother filed wrongful-death actions in state and federal court challenging the shooting. Gonzales remained employed by the San Juan County Sheriff's Office following Thomas's death. The disputed Thomas shooting occurred less than two months before five unidentified deputies killed Werito.
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That history is relevant to the agency rather than evidence that the five deputies who killed Werito acted improperly. Because their names remain unavailable, it cannot presently be determined whether Gonzales or any deputy involved in the Thomas shooting was among the five deputies who fired at Werito.
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The agency's handling of Werito's shooting did include an important outside-investigation safeguard. Farmington Police Department served as the primary investigative agency through the regional officer-involved-shooting task force rather than allowing the Sheriff's Office to conduct the principal criminal investigation of its own deputies.
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The Sheriff's Office also released body-worn-camera footage within weeks of the killing. The recording materially improves the evidentiary record because it documents the prolonged barricade and portions of the circumstances immediately preceding the five deputies' gunfire.
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The most important remaining officer-background issue is therefore identification of those five deputies. With five officers firing, a complete update requires the shooting roster from the task-force investigation followed by an individual background review of each deputy.

SOURCE LINKS :

https://www.daily-times.com/story/news/crime/2021/09/14/san-juan-county-deputies-shoot-kill-man-farmington/8339898002/
https://www.krqe.com/news/new-mexico/deputies-shoot-kill-man-during-warrant-service-in-san-juan-county/
https://www.kob.com/new-mexico/deputies-kill-man-during-warrant-service-in-san-juan-county/
https://www.krqe.com/news/crime/video-shows-san-juan-co-deputies-open-fire-on-man-who-pointed-replica-gun/
https://www.kob.com/archive/lapel-video-details-what-led-to-deadly-san-juan-county-shooting/
https://www.ksje.com/news/local-news/man-fatally-shot-sheriffs-office-shooting-investigated/
https://www.durangoherald.com/articles/news/suspect-dead-after-officer-involved-shooting-in-east-farmington/
https://www.the-journal.com/articles/suspect-dead-after-officer-involved-shooting-east-of-downtown-farmington/