One police officer must be still thanking Jesus for His protection after surviving an intense shootout during what should have been a routine traffic stop.
The incident occurred on April 16 and police are now able to release the incredible harrowing footage.
In the video, officer Tyler Sauvage pulls over a pickup truck with a male driver and two passengers, but sadly it quickly took a dangerous turn.
Officer Sauvage simply asked the driver to turn off the vehicle and place the keys where he could see them. Seems like a simple request to you and me, right?
However, the driver doesn’t want to comply with the officer’s request but eventually does.
That is when the officer catches a whiff of marijuana coming from the vehicle so the officer asks for the driver to step outside the car.
You then can hear the front seat passenger asking the back-seat passenger (a woman) for a gun.
After again asking the driver to exit the vehicle, shots are fired by the front-seat passenger, striking the officer’s hand and destroying his radio.
An intense but quick shootout ensued, leaving the driver and the front-seat passenger killed.
KSAT has more on the incident:
The shooting happened around 11:27 a.m., April 16, in the 2300 block of Pinn Road when Officer Tyler Sauvage, a five-year veteran, conducted a traffic stop on a blue pickup truck.
The video shows Sauvage approach the truck, which was occupied by two men and a woman, and instruct the driver to stop going through his pockets.
The driver was then asked to turn off the car and place the keys where the officer could see them.
Sauvage asked for the driver’s ID and moments later, told him to step out of the truck after saying he could smell marijuana.
The driver admitted to the officer that he smoked marijuana earlier and that it was just the smell — that he hadn’t had any in his possession. He said to the officer in the video that he was “…Just being honest with you.”
In the video, a police official said the front seat passenger is heard asking the backseat passenger for a gun. The officer then opens the driver’s door and in just a matter of seconds, the suspects fire multiple gunshots.
Sauvage is hit by the gunfire in the hand, which is seen in the video covered in blood, and he retreated to his vehicle. His police radio was also hit in the exchange.
The officer dropped his weapon in the video after being shot, but he was able to retrieve it before taking cover behind his police unit.
Here is the dashcam footage of the shooting:
The San Antonio Police Department released this video of the shooting:
