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A widow who watched police officers fatally shoot her hatchet-wielding husband inside the couple’s home two years ago has launched a $17-million lawsuit against London police.

Melissa Facciolo filed the lawsuit on behalf of the estate of her common-law husband, Samuel Maloney, 35, who died during a police raid on his Old South home on Dec. 23, 2016.

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A computer programmer with a history of erratic behaviour and run-ins with police, Maloney was shot five times after firing a crossbow at a police officer and charging at others with a hatchet, the Special Investigations Unit (SIU) said in a report released last year.

The three officers who shot Maloney – London’s only fatal police shooting in the past two decades – were later cleared of any wrongdoing by Ontario’s police watchdog.

The lawsuit alleges police should have known that the pre-dawn raid by 11 emergency response officers on Maloney’s Duchess Avenue home, where his wife and children were inside, could have resulted in serious injury or death, according to the recently filed statement of claim.