A man is dead after he was tased by an Etowah County sheriff's deputy during an altercation in front of the Etowah County Sheriff's Office, officials said.

Shortly before 5 p.m. Wednesday, a woman told deputies a man was in the sheriff's office parking lot harassing people, sheriff's spokeswoman Natalie Barton said. Two deputies found the male about to enter the sheriff's office and started talking to him.

At some point, the man and deputies got in a physical altercation and a deputy used a taser on the man, she said. Medical personnel were called to the scene and took the man to the hospital, where he died.

Barton said the cause of death is unknown and an autopsy will determine his exact cause of death.

The Oxford Police Department will be investigating the case.

Barton said the man was not an inmate or a suspect who was being booked into the jail. The man was not identified.

Additional details were not immediately available.