Man with machete fatally shot by Whittier police

A man armed with a machete was fatally shot by police Wednesday morning in a Whittier neighborhood, officials said.

Police received a call about 6 a.m. from a person reporting that a man was waving a machete in the 13400 block of Penn Street, Whittier Police Lt. Kent Miller told reporters at the scene.

Two officers approached the man and talked to him for a few minutes, Miller said.

He then threw a stick at one officer and lunged at the other while holding the machete, according to the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department.

Both officers fired their weapons, striking the man multiple times.

The two officers then began performing CPR on the man, police said.

When firefighters arrived at the scene, they found the man in “traumatic cardiac arrest,” said Inspector Rich Licon, a spokesman for the Los Angeles County Fire Department.

The man was taken to a hospital, where he was pronounced dead, said Ed Winter, assistant chief of investigations for the Los Angeles County coroner’s office.

The man, who was in his 30s, has not been identified.

Los Angeles County sheriff’s homicide detectives are assisting the Whittier Police Department with their investigation.

This article will be updated as more information becomes available.

veronica.rocha@latimes.com

For breaking news in California, follow @VeronicaRochaLA on Twitter.

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UPDATES:

12:45 p.m.: This article was updated with comments from the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department with details about what led up to the shooting.

10:15 a.m.: This article was updated with comments from Lt. Kent Miller about the sequence of events at the scene, and the man pronounced dead at a hospital.

This article was originally published at 9:15 a.m.