Staff Writers

OAKLAND — Emeryville police shot and killed a woman who authorities said was armed after a store owner called police to report a theft Tuesday afternoon.

Police were called to a store on the 3800 block of Hollis Street around 12:35 p.m. A shopkeeper reported a ‘combative’ theft suspect, then called back while police were still en route to say that the woman had left the scene and was armed. The two officers found her in the area of 34th Street and Hollis Street, where they confronted the suspect and shot her.

Police said they recovered an unspecified type of firearm at the scene.

Police would not immediately say if one or both officers fired on the suspect, how many shots they fired, or if the woman drew her weapon or fired on the officers. The woman, who has not been identified, died at the scene.

No one else was injured.

Russ Whitehead, of Oakland, said he was pulling his car into a storage facility on Hollis Street when he heard a woman screaming, and police yelling commands at her. He dove to the floor of his car as he heard six or seven shots, breaking out his windows.

“It was so fast. She apparently came right up to my car, then the screaming started,” he said. “Then bam, bam, bam, bam.

“There’s usually not bullets passing six inches from my nose. I was a little shaken.”

Anotherwitness said that the woman did not appear to be armed as she tried to flag down a passing bus, which did not stop.

“We (saw) a woman running, holding her purse and waving her hand,” said Marilyn Tijerino, who was riding the AC Transit 31 line on her way home. “The girl did not have no gun. She was waving her hands.”

A vigil for the woman was planned at the site of the shooting at 7:30 p.m. Tuesday.

The area where she was fatally shot is adjacent to Interstate 580 near a storage unit facility and several businesses.

An Emeryville police spokesperson said that some of the department’s officers wear video cameras, but was unsure if either officer involved in the shooting was wearing a camera at the time.

Because the shooting took place inside Oakland city limits, Oakland police were running their own probe of the shooting; The Emeryville Police Department and the Alameda County District Attorney’s Office were also investigating.

Oakland police spokeswoman Johnna Watson said that investigators were looking for video or still images from surveillance cameras at local businesses.

The Oakland incident was one of two fatal police shootings that took place within a few minutes on Tuesday afternoon. Around 12:40 p.m., Contra Costa Sheriff’s deputies shot and killed a man who they said charged them with a weapon while they were trying to serve him with a restraining order in Antioch.