Phoenix police officer attacked, injured in standoff

PHOENIX – A Phoenix police officer suffered an eye injury and broken hand after responding to a call about a man yelling in a front yard Saturday night.

When the officer arrived, he says 29-year-old Bobby Keen approached him requesting help before punching him in the face.

“And, at that point, unfortunately, the fight was on,” Phoenix Public Information Officer James Holmes told KTAR.

As the unidentified officer struggled with Keen, he used a Taser gun on the assailant twice. A second officer on the scene near 7th Street and Union Hills Road also used his Taser, but they say Keen kept fighting and was able to make it back inside his home.

Holmes said more officers arrived and they organized a team, which included a canine, to approach Keen’s front door.

“Initially, he refuses to come out and when he does come out, he approaches and attacks the officers again,” Holmes said.

“At that point he (was) actually shot with four rounds of a stun gun in order to get this man subdued and it didn’t work.”

Holmes said Keen managed to get up and lock himself inside his home again before officers and the canine moved in and found him in a bedroom. Keen’s girlfriend was inside the home as well, according to Holmes’ account. She told officers that her boyfriend had used drugs earlier that day.

Keen was taken to the hospital for observation. The injured officer has since been released from the hospital.

“You’ve got an individual who’s out by himself just yelling and screaming for no apparent reason and neighbors start to call and thank goodness none of those neighbors actually went out to see what was wrong with him or they might have ended up in a confrontation with him,” said Holmes.