Font ResizeSalt Lake City police shocked a man using a Taser and arrested him following a foot chase downtown on Monday afternoon.
A former Salt Lake City police officer saw the man running in and out of traffic near 300 South and Main Street and believed the man was trying to hide a knife in his waist band, said Salt Lake City Detective Dennis McGowan.
The former officer called police. When uniformed officers showed up, the man ran north one block to 200 South and Main Street, near the parking lot at the Hotel Monaco, McGowan said.
An officer chased the man as fellow officers converged and joined in the pursuit, McGowan said.
When the man got to the hotel's parking lot, he tossed something in the trash can.
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Officers eventually caught up to the man and used a Taser on him, causing a knife to fall out of his hand. It is unclear whether the man ever brandished the knife to police.
The man was taken to the Salt Lake County jail.
McGowan said police were justified in the shocking because they had information that an armed man was fleeing police.
Police can shock dangerous or violent people "aggressively resisting or attempting to flee," McGowan said.
