By Kevin O’Neal
Indianapolis Star
INDIANAPOLIS, Ind. — A machete-wielding man was shot and killed Thursday night on the Westside by the Indianapolis Metropolitan Police Department. That incident came nearly three months after another conformation where the same man had threatened to take police officers’ guns and shoot himself.
Ray Ponder, 48, was declared dead last night at Wishard Memorial Hospital, around an hour and a half following the shooting. A police officer shot Ponder in the head after he raised a machete as if to strike his girlfriend or the officer.
The police officer, 34-year-old Frederick Lantzer, with seven years experience, has been removed from street patrol and placed on administrative duty while the case is investigated by homicide detectives, the police internal affairs unit and a grand jury.
The incident happened at 3301 W. 10th Street around 9:36 p.m. Thursday, according to a police statement from Sgt. Matthew Mount, IMPD spokesman. It was the second time in as many nights that police had been called to the residence because of Ponder’s actions. An ambulance had been called to take him to a mental health facility on Wednesday.
On Thursday night, Rebecca Clark, identified as Ponder’s girlfriend, contacted a friend to say that Ponder was erratic and threatening her with a knife. That friend called 911 with the information and police were sent to Ponder’s residence.
When three officers arrived and went into the residence with Clark, they encountered Ponder, armed with a machete, leaving the bedroom, according to the statement from Mount.
When Ponder walked toward the officers, one pulled Clark back and drew his gun, ordering Ponder to get back and drop his weapon. As the officers tried to get out of the residence’s back door and Ponder kept approaching then, raising the machete, one of the police shot Ponder in the head.
Earlier this year, Ponder was involved in a confrontation with police that led to him being restrained at a hospital after threatening to kill himself.
The incident happened on March 2 at the emergency room of Wishard Memorial Hospital, according to a report from the Indianapolis Metropolitan Police Department. Ponder had been brought to the hospital in an ambulance, and police were called when he jumped out and tried to get under the vehicle. The report said that Ponder was “extremely paranoid” and was not taking medication.
Ponder then tried to run out of the emergency room and was stopped by police and handcuffed. The report then said that Ponder told officers that "{$326}he wanted our guns so that he could shoot himself. He then stated that if we didn’t give him our weapons, that he would go out and find one on his own.”
Ponder was placed in detention at the hospital but not arrested.
The only Marion County criminal conviction on Ponder’s record came in 1989, when he pleaded guilty to carrying a firearm without a license and received a one-year suspended sentence. Ponder was arrested for criminal recklessness in 1998, but the charge was dismissed before it went to trial.
Copyright 2009 Indianapolis Star