DA releases video showing the fatal confrontation between a mentally ill mother and Salinas police.

It’s impossible to tell the gun wasn’t real, and the mental health system could have done better.

If there are takeaways from the hour-long press conference held April 2 by Monterey County District Attorney Jeannine Pacioni on the fatal encounter between 20-year-old Brenda Rodriguez and Salinas police, those are it. Absent the orange tip that would have signified the pistol was in reality a BB gun, there was no way for police to tell the weapon Rodriguez repeatedly pointed at them was harmless, Pacioni says. And while a Monterey County Behavioral Health worker was requested at the scene about 90 minutes before Rodriguez brandished the weapon at police a final time, that worker only arrived 15 minutes before the encounter ended in a hail of 18 bullets fired at the mentally ill woman who was described as paranoid, psychotic, delusional and hearing voices.

While the DA investigation into police actions leading to Rodriguez’s death is still underway, Pacioni released a 34-minute video showing the last portion of the multi-hour encounter that took place March 1 outside the home Rodriguez’s boyfriend shared with his mother.

As Pacioni recounted while showing the video, Rodriguez and her boyfriend had argued that morning, and he left the East Laurel Drive property. His mother called 911 at 10:30am to report Rodriguez had brandished a screwdriver at her and threatened to kill her.

By the time police arrived, Rodriguez had sequestered herself inside a broken-down Ford Explorer parked in the home’s driveway, a vehicle loaded with personal property and in which she slept because she wasn’t allowed in the home. With the gun in hand and extended through a broken car window, she screamed at police and threatened to kill them.

What followed was a protracted negotiation in which Salinas Police Officer Raul Rosales tried to cajole Rodriguez into surrendering as officers scrambled to get social workers and county Behavioral Health on the scene. On the video, Rosales repeatedly tells Rodriguez, in English and Spanish, he wants to get her help so she could be reunited with her boyfriend and her infant daughter and live as a family. Rodriguez had given birth to a baby girl three weeks before, and the newborn was taken away from her by Social Services officials because the infant had meth in her system when she was born.

“Get closer so I can shoot you in the head, I’m going to kill you,” Rodriguez told police, according to Pacioni.

Rosales repeatedly offered to call Rodriguez’s Child Protective Services caseworker to talk about next steps toward reuniting her with her baby. And while officers on the scene consulted with Behavioral Health workers on the phone, a department worker didn’t arrive for more than an hour after being called.

Police considered a variety of non-lethal methods to secure Rodriguez’s surrender: Rubber bullets weren’t used because only Rodriguez’s head was visible, and a headshot with a rubber bullet could have been fatal, Pacioni says. Tear gas was considered and disregarded due to the amount of flammable material inside the vehicle. And tasers likely would not have worked because of the distance between police and Rodriguez.

Rodriguez raised the gun at police four times. After the final time, three officers fired 18 rounds at her; Pacioni was unable to say how many rounds struck Rodriguez because the autopsy report has yet to be completed. However, Pacioni says, Rodriguez had a high level of antidepressant drugs in her system.

While Rodriguez’s boyfriend described Rodriguez as bipolar and says she had run out of her medication, it’s unclear what other medications she was prescribed. Citing privacy laws, Behavioral Health officials have refused comment.