Maui police said Thursday that the stolen rental car driven by a 31-year-old Wailuku man killed by a police officer Tuesday contained firearms.
Police detectives executed a search warrant for the stolen vehicle Wednesday and recovered a glass smoking pipe, firearms and additional unnamed items. Police declined to say how many or what kind of guns were recovered.
Police said Marshall Langford was inside the stolen blue Chevrolet Impala when he pointed a handgun at a police officer in the Mana Kai Maui resort parking lot Tuesday morning.
His family told the Maui News he was not reaching for a gun when he was shot, but a cellphone.
Genevieve Langford said her 31-year-old son didn’t have a gun and that police didn’t need to use deadly force.
“They could have Tasered him or shoot the tires, do something like that,” she said. “They’re trained. They didn’t have to shoot. There were other ways and means,” she told the newspaper.
The 18-year police veteran who shot Langford has been placed on administrative leave. His name has not been released, but he was assigned to the Kihei Police Station.
Several hundred hotel guests were kept out of their rooms for more than three hours while police searched for a suspect who had been with Langford. A 28-year-old man later turned himself in to police. He was released Thursday morning pending investigation.
Langford was a passenger in the car when the 28-year-old man drove them to the resort where a friend works, Langford’s younger brother, Marcus Langford, said. The driver, of Wailuku, turned himself in to police Tuesday evening and was arrested on suspicion of being a felon in possession of a firearm and unauthorized entry into a motor vehicle.
Marshall Langford’s mother said her son wouldn’t have fled and that even if the car was stolen, that’s no excuse to shoot him.
Records show he had 18 criminal convictions, including five for unauthorized entry into a motor vehicle.
“He did make bad choices,” Genevieve Langford said of his drug use and dropping out of high school. “My son wasn’t perfect, but he didn’t have to die that way.”
Langford was married, with a 10-year-old son.
Police said the investigation is ongoing and that more cases involving the stolen rental car and the two men are being investigated.
