Billings police shot and killed a man this week at a South Side apartment complex after authorities said he pointed a handgun at them.
At 4:12 p.m. on Monday, dispatchers sent officers to the area of Ninth Avenue South and South 31st Street to serve a temporary restraining order on Michael Carr, Interim Police Chief Shawn Mayo said at a press conference Tuesday. Carr also used the name David Fuller, Mayo said.
The man seeking the restraining order called back at 4:25 p.m. to say Carr had pulled a gun on him and his son, according to a Billings Police Department press release. He also said Carr “had several knives on his hip,” Mayo said.
Officers found Carr at 4:29 p.m., and he fled on foot toward an apartment complex at 801 S. 28th St. Carr moved through a courtyard at the complex and toward a carport, Mayo said. There were children in the courtyard, he said.
Officers ordered Carr to stop, but he ignored them, went into a carport and then reemerged pointing a gun at them, Mayo said.
Officer Nathan Finn, 31, fired four shots at Carr, striking him, and started CPR, Mayo said. Finn has been with the department for one year and nine months. Emergency medical staff pronounced Carr dead at the scene, Mayo said.
Officers recovered a 9mm handgun, which they say Carr had been holding.
Carr, 61, had been living in Billings for at least two years, Mayo said. During that time, contact with police in Billings was “very limited,” Mayo said, but he had an “extensive violent history” from Florida, including burglary, weapons and sex crime charges.
Mayo said he did not know anything more about the relationship between Carr and the man with the restraining order.
The Montana Division of Criminal Investigation will review the shooting, Mayo said.
“It should be noted that the officers followed state law and department policy,” Mayo said. “The decision to use force was mandated by the suspect.”
Mayo said this was the second officer-involved shooting in Billings in 2026. There was an additional one in 2025, he said.
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