A Yale University Police officer fired two rounds into a man's locked SUV behind the New Haven Lawn Club on October 14, shooting out the rear driver-side window and then the front passenger window as other officers pulled the man from the driver's seat. The man, 48-year-old Jose Cubiz, had been threatening to kill himself with a kitchen knife while family members begged police for help, and newly released body camera footage shows the tense standoff that ended with officers extracting him and giving medical aid.
According to the Yale Daily News, Officer Ancil Farrier responded to a 9 a.m. call about an emotionally distressed person in a parking lot behind 205 Whitney Avenue. Cubiz was sitting in a white SUV and, per a press release cited by the outlet, threatened to kill himself if officers tried to come inside before appearing to begin stabbing himself with the knife. Farrier said he needed someone to break the window, then announced he would shoot through it himself — which he did, discharging his firearm into the glass as officers moved in from the other side to pull Cubiz from the driver's seat.
Separate reporting from Daily Voice places the incident at approximately 8:50 a.m. that day, in the lot owned by the New Haven Lawn Club, after family members alerted police that Cubiz was armed with a kitchen knife inside the locked vehicle. The lot sits adjacent to the Yale campus. Body-worn camera video released by the Connecticut Office of Inspector General shows Farrier firing a round through the rear driver-side window, then walking around the front of the SUV to fire a second round into the front passenger window while other officers were actively entering the vehicle from the driver's side, FOX61 reported.
No Indication Cubiz Was Struck By Gunfire
Per the Inspector General's account relayed by the Yale Daily News, Cubiz did not appear to be struck by the gunfire itself. He was treated at Yale New Haven Hospital for self-inflicted stab wounds before being remanded to the custody of the state Department of Correction. Cubiz was serving a 54-month special parole sentence tied to a prior first-degree robbery conviction, according to the same reporting cited by FOX61.
Duane Lovello, Yale's head of public safety, wrote in an email to the Yale Daily News on October 15 that the officer broke the vehicle window using a firearm that discharged — a characterization that frames the shooting as a rescue tactic rather than a use of force against Cubiz himself. The Connecticut Office of Inspector General published the body camera footage on Friday, two days after the shooting.
State And University Police Both Under Review
Connecticut's Office of Inspector General, led by Inspector General Eliot D. Prescott, and the Connecticut State Police Central District Major Crime Squad have opened a joint inquiry into Farrier's firearm discharge, according to Eastern CT News. Under Connecticut General Statutes governing police use of force, the state Office of Inspector General is legally required to conduct an independent investigation whenever a peace officer discharges a firearm in the line of duty, regardless of whether the shooting results in injury or death.
The Yale University Police Department, founded in 1894, is the nation's oldest campus police force. It maintains 93 sworn officers who hold full municipal police authority and citywide jurisdiction in New Haven, subject to appointment by the New Haven Board of Police Commissioners, according to PoliceApp. State agendas from the Police Officer Standards and Training Council recorded Farrier as an active Yale officer undergoing standard probationary and certification extension processes in September 2023.
Because YPD operates with full municipal law enforcement powers across the city, this shooting lands amid a history of intense scrutiny over the department's use of force. In April 2019, a joint officer-involved shooting involving a Yale police officer and a Hamden police officer wounded an unarmed vehicle passenger, Stephanie Washington, sparking widespread local protests and an independent operational review of Yale's policing policies by 21CP Solutions, Connecticut Public Radio reported. That 2019 incident led to criminal charges against the Hamden officer and an administrative suspension for the Yale officer.
Ronnell Higgins, who led Yale's police department as Chief of Police and Associate Vice President for Public Safety during the post-2019 reform period, was confirmed by the Connecticut House of Representatives in March 2024 as Commissioner of the Department of Emergency Services and Public Protection — the state agency that oversees the Connecticut State Police now co-investigating this month's shooting, per records from CT.gov.
Part Of A Wider Pattern Of Crisis Calls Turning Deadly
The Whitney Avenue incident happened amid a broader stretch of fraught police encounters during wellness checks across Connecticut, including an October 16 fatal police shooting during a wellness check on Chippens Hill in Bristol, as Hoodline reported. Connecticut officers are facing increasing public scrutiny over how they resolve mental health crises without resorting to lethal force.
The Yale Daily News article was authored by Evelyn Ronan, with senior photography credited to Paul-Alexander Lejas and additional reporting contributed by Norah McPartland. The Inspector General's investigation into Farrier's discharge remains ongoing alongside the state police review.
