A Washington, D.C. police officer fired 10 shots, killing a 27-year-old Black man who had been asleep in a BMW moments earlier, according to body camera footage that was released on Thursday.

Antwan Gilmore, who lived in Capitol Heights, Maryland, was asleep when officers called to the scene on Wednesday for a man unconscious behind the wheel of a vehicle, Metropolitan Police Department Chief of Police Robert Contee III said during a news conference initially covered by NBC Washington: “Officers responded to that location. They observed an individual who was behind the wheel of a black BMW vehicle, and that individual was armed with a firearm in his waistband area,” the chief said. “The officers called for additional units to assist them, developed a tactical plan. They also deployed a ballistic shield in an effort to shield themselves from any potential gunfire in this situation.”

Contee said officers attempted to wake the driver, who was later identified as Gilmore, and at some point, “he awakened from his sleep … And at that point that individual was engaged by officers and then from some point from there shots were fired,” Contee said. “The subject was struck. The subject was taken to an area hospital, and he has been pronounced deceased at this time.” Contee said that “from what we know preliminarily, this individual was known to law enforcement.”

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A firearm was recovered from the BMW and the incident is being investigated by the Metropolitan Police Department, internal affairs, and the police department’s homicide unit, the chief said. About five officers engaged with Gilmore in the incident, but the chief said it appears only one officer—who has not been named publicly—was fired. “After the shots were fired, it appeared the individual in the car drove the vehicle” from Florida Avenue and New York Avenue where it “came to rest,” Contee said. He admitted that the body camera footage from the officer who fired was blocked by the officer’s ballistic shield. “So as we review body-warn camera and look through this, we’ll try to get a better picture of what happened, but right now the initial officer’s body-worn camera appears to be somewhat restricted,” Contee said. “The view is somewhat restricted because of the ballistic shield that’s deployed in front of him if that makes sense.”

Warning: This video contains disturbing footage of a police shooting that may be difficult to watch for some viewers.

He said officials don’t know if the driver was intoxicated. “Well, it’s not a situation obviously that we want to find ourselves in, but clearly what we know is that we had an armed individual behind the wheel of a vehicle,” Contee said. “Between the time that the officers responded and the time that the officers actually engaged the individual, there was probably about a 20-minute gap. So in that time officers were formulating a plan, trying to figure out the best way to resolve this with an armed individual behind the wheel of a car sleep at a traffic light.” Contee said officers were “careful” in trying to wake the driver up. “You hear things like ‘we don’t want to scare him,'” the chief said. It’s unclear what specific action led the officer to fire at Gilmore. 

“It’s unfortunate,” Contee said when asked about the fact that this is the second police shooting involving department officers in 24 hours. The suspect shot in the other incident occurring during that period, survived, a local news stations reported. “It’s unfortunate that we have to come face-to-face with armed gunmen in our community,” Contee said. “You know, clearly when people are in possession of illegal firearms—we’ve been talking about that for a long time—it makes communities unsafe. It makes our police officers unsafe.” He added that it’s “unfortunate that someone lost their life” but that he’s “happy” that the police officer wasn’t injured in the situation.

Krysten Thomas, a Georgetown Law student, and Paul Seamus Ryan, vice president for policy and litigation with the nonprofit government watchdog Common Cause, tweeted on Friday that they were longtime neighbors of Gilmore. “@DCPoliceDept found my friend and longtime neighbor #AntwanGilmore sleeping in his car, startled him awake, then shot and killed him,” Ryan said in his tweet. “This other guy shut down Capitol Hill for a day with a bomb threat and was then gently taken into custody. This is what racism looks like.” 

Thomas, who retweeted Ryan, said: “#AntwanGilmore was our neighbor for 15+ years, and he did not deserve to die at a traffic light. Black heart As @ThePaulSRyan said, this what racism looks like. I want to say more because Antwan deserves that, but I really do not know what else to say. #Stunned #Devastated.”

D.C. Council member Janeese Lewis George similarly tweeted in a thread on Wednesday: “Sitting here trying to figure out how law enforcement can successfully deescalate a white domestic terrorist in a truck threatening to blow up the Capitol with a bomb but not a Black man who fell asleep in his car?” She called for the “immediate release of all body camera footage and a full investigation” of both recent police shootings in D.C. “Every shooting is a tragedy,” she said. “Our communities need transparency and accountability.”