HOMESTEAD, Fla. – A mother was grieving her 34-year-old son on Sunday in Homestead. He died during a police-involved shooting on Saturday at his home.
Katia Chong showed Local 10 News bullet holes peppered the front door and interior walls of his home, and his blood was on the floor and walls.
Through tears, she said her son Leandro Francisco Ledea Chong lived with schizophrenia, which usually involves hallucinations and delusions.
“He was a good kid and the police killed him as if he was an assassin or as if he would have committed a crime,” the grieving mother said in Spanish.
Katia Chong said her son was going through a mental health crisis when loved ones called the police for help on Friday. Madeleine Cabrera, his girlfriend, said he was close to getting the help he needed before police officers fatally shot him on Saturday at the Villas of Sunrise development.
“The 22nd was his day in court. A judge ordered him to go to a mental health hospital,” Cabrera said.
Capt. Fernando Morales, a spokesman for the Homestead Police Department, said the standoff on Friday ended without incident. A witness video shows Leandro Chong standing at the front door and talking to himself. He had a fanny bag.
Morales said police officers responded to a report of shots fired at the same house on Saturday morning and Leandro Chong threw things at police officers and had his hands inside a fanny bag before the police-involved shooting.
On a GoFundMe page, Luisa Delvals and Karen Jam described Leandro Chong as “an amazing stepfather and an amazing husband.” They claim that all he had in his fanny pack were his keys, a rehab brochure, and a screwdriver.
After the police-involved shooting, the Florida Department of Law Enforcement was conducting an investigation and the officers involved were on administrative leave.
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Clarification: Local 10 News has not seen the alleged video evidence referenced on the GoFundMe page mentioned in this story.