JERSEY CITY—The New Jersey Attorney General’s Office of Public Integrity and Accountability (OPIA) released redacted bodycam footage on April 2 from a fatal police shooting that occurred in September 2025. The footage offers a detailed look at the confrontation that left 26-year-old Steven B. Sanchez dead near Kennedy Boulevard and Clinton Avenue.

State policy typically requires these recordings be released within about 20 days of witness interviews under the 2019 Independent Prosecutor Directive, but this video dropped seven months after the incident. The Attorney General’s Office said family representatives got to review the footage before it went public.

The footage shows what happened in the moments before and during the shooting, which started around 1:22 p.m. At around that point, Jersey City Police Sergeant Ricardo Reyes made a U-turn on Kennedy Boulevard after a civilian witness identified Sanchez as the man firing at police vehicles. The confrontation occurred near the intersection with Clinton Avenue, a four-lane undivided stretch of the boulevard. Four officers in two marked vehicles had been targeted in the initial gunfire.

Sanchez was standing on the sidewalk near the intersection, holding what authorities later said was a compressed air pistol. In the audio, officers can be heard shouting repeatedly: "Put it down. Put it down. Put it down" and "Don't do it. Hey listen, put it down." The video shows Sanchez raising the weapon and pointing it toward officers. During the encounter, Sgt. Reyes fired his service weapon, hitting Sanchez.

After the initial shots, the video shows Sanchez still moving toward Reyes. According to the Attorney General’s summary, Sanchez kept firing the air pistol and moved toward Sgt. Reyes, leading to a physical struggle. Surveillance footage reviewed by NJ.com shows Sanchez grabbing at the officer’s gun during the confrontation. Sanchez screamed loudly as three officers worked to subdue him.

A witness waiting at a nearby bus stop told CBS News the next day that he saw Sanchez crawling after being shot, still trying to resist officers. Initial reports indicated no officers were struck by gunfire, though Reyes was later found to have a non-life-threatening injury from the physical struggle.

Emergency responders took Sanchez to Jersey City Medical Center, where he was pronounced dead around 8:45 p.m., more than seven hours after the shooting. Investigators recovered the weapon at the scene.

The Attorney General’s Office called the weapon a "compressed air pistol," though NJ.com referred to it as a "pellet gun" and News 12 New Jersey described it as an "air gun or BB gun." These weapons aren't classified as firearms under state law, but they can look a lot like real handguns, something authorities often point to when evaluating use-of-force situations.

The release is part of the Attorney General’s ongoing investigation, required under N.J.S.A. 52:17B-107(a)(2) for any death during a police encounter. The statute requires the Attorney General to present these cases to a grand jury to determine if the use of force was legally justified. State officials didn’t announce any conclusions with the footage, emphasizing that the investigation is still active.

The footage provides a visual record of what happened, but it doesn’t determine legal responsibility on its own. That determination will depend on the state’s investigation findings and the grand jury review.

⚠️ Viewer Warning: The following videos contain graphic footage of a fatal police encounter and may be disturbing.

Watch the official footage released by the Attorney General’s Office.

Sources

• New Jersey Office of the Attorney General, "Update: AG’s Office Releases Video Footage from Ongoing Investigation of Fatal Police-Involved Shooting in Jersey City" (April 2, 2026)

• New Jersey Office of the Attorney General, Body-worn camera footage and official incident summary, Office of Public Integrity and Accountability (April 2, 2026)

• New Jersey Attorney General Law Enforcement Professional Standards Unit, Independent Prosecutor Directive No. 2019-4 (December 4, 2019)

• Hudson County View, "AG’s Office releases vids where Jersey City man who shot at police cars was killed by cop" (April 2, 2026)

• Kevin Shea, NJ.com, "Videos released in N.J. fatal police shooting show man with pellet gun" (April 2, 2026)

• News 12 New Jersey staff, "Body camera video released in fatal Jersey City police shooting" (April 2, 2026)

• CBS News New York, "Jersey City police kill man who fired gun at patrol cars in busy section of city" (September 6, 2025)

• RLS Media, "AG: Jersey City police sergeant fatally shot man who fired air pistol during confrontation" (April 2, 2026)

• NJ.com, "Jersey City swears in 9 new police officers, promotes 15 officers to sergeant" (November 23, 2022)