The El Rancho Motel from Second Street in Barstow
BARSTOW – A San Bernardino County Sheriff’s deputy shot a man last week after he tried to flee and eventually started a fight.
Nathaniel Harris Pickett, 29, of Barstow, was spotted by the deputy jumping a fence into the parking lot of a motel on Main Street.
The deputy, who had been patrolling on Thursday night, November 19 with a citizen volunteer, stopped Pickett to question him shortly after 9 p.m.
Barstow Police Detective Keith Libby said that Pickett gave a false name to the deputy, then “became uncooperative.” When the deputy tried to handcuff Pickett, he tried to run and “almost immediately (started) a fight.” The scuffle took both men to the ground, Pickett striking the deputy numerous times in the face. Libby said Pickett “refused to comply with the repeated verbal commands to stop hitting him and move away.”
The East Main Street entrance to the El Rancho Motel
Eventually, the deputy fired his weapon, striking the subject and ending the assault. Emergency medical units responded to the scene, along with Sheriff’s department and Barstow Police personnel. The deputy, who suffered broken bones among his injuries, was taken to a nearby hospital for treatment, according to reports. The deputy’s name was not released, pending an investigation. Barstow police and sheriff’s homicide investigators are conducting the investigation.
Pickett, a convicted felon for crimes committed in 2006 and 2011, was pronounced dead at the scene. Court records show that Pickett was sentenced in 2012 to three years of conditional and revocable release related to a 2006 misdemeanor conviction.
That conviction stemmed from obstructing an executive officer arrest, also sentenced to three years of supervised probation after pleading no contest to both felony counts for obstructing an executive officer.
Pickett, a patient in the county’s mental health program, was also sentenced from a 2011 arrest on charges of felony false impersonation, according to court records.
