Police justified in slaying of suspect

Keith Paul

Monday, July 16, 2001 | 10:31 a.m.

A Clark County Coroner's inquest jury needed less than 20 minutes Friday to rule the June 2 shooting of a murder suspect by two Metro Police officers was justified.

Metro Police Officer Carlos Acosta shot 21-year-old Jeff Canterbury in the head and Officer Damian Walburn shot him twice in the leg as his 17-year-old girlfriend was next to him in a bed in a Tam Drive apartment.

Police maintained Canterbury had a gun stuck into the side of Nichole Nick.

"She was yelling hysterically, 'He's got a gun. He's going to kill me,' " Acosta said during the daylong inquest Friday. "I knew in my heart he was going to kill one of us. I was scared not only for the girl but also for the officers."

Police received information Canterbury, wanted on a warrant charging him with the May 26 slaying of Jeremy Buckles in Henderson, was in an apartment on Tam Drive near Baltimore Avenue.

While Acosta and Walburn testified they believed Canterbury was threatening Nick and feared he was going to kill her, Nick testified she wasn't afraid of him.

"I laid on top of him because I thought they wouldn't shoot him," Nick testified. "I was so scared. I didn't want to die."

Nick admitted the pair smoked methamphetamine while police at first went to the wrong apartment. She said Canterbury knew the police would be coming for him.

When questioned by Chief District Attorney Jim Miller, Nick admitted she might have yelled, "He's got a gun. He's going to shoot me."