The family of a man with a hatchet who was shot and killed by an Oakland police officer has filed a federal civil rights suit against the city, saying that the hatchet was simply a work tool and that the man posed no threat to police.

Brownie Polk, 46, of Oakland was shot at Tolins Liquors at 71st Avenue and International Boulevard shortly after 9 p.m. Aug. 1 when he pulled out a hatchet, held it over his head and confronted an officer, police have said.

The officer had been flagged down by a store employee who said Polk was being disruptive. Polk walked toward the officer with the hatchet and ignored numerous commands, prompting the officer to fire several shots, police said.

A video from the store corroborated the officer's account, police said.

But Officer Yanicka Taylor had no reason to shoot Polk because he was "unarmed and posed no danger to himself or others," said the suit filed Tuesday in U.S. District Court in San Francisco by Santa Ana attorney Federico Sayre.

"She was far enough away from him that he didn't represent an immediate threat to her or anybody else," Sayre said Friday. "I don't know what was in her head."

Sayre said the department has refused to release a copy of the video.

Polk's relatives have said that he had the tool because he worked as a handyman and that it was not a weapon.

"He would never charge at police with a hatchet," his sister, Marsha Polk-Townsend, said shortly after Polk was killed. "I would bet my life on it."

Officer Jeff Thomason, an Oakland police spokesman, said he could not comment because the case is in litigation.

Sayre filed the suit on behalf of Polk-Townsend and Polk's 16-year-old son, Brandon Polk. The complaint seeks unspecified damages and names Oakland and Taylor as defendants.