Lovelle Mixon’s relatives say they could tell his frustration was building inside, says the Oakland Tribune. After serving the better part of the last decade behind bars, the 26-year-old was free again in November. He planned to do better and wanted to meet the requirements mandated by his second time on parole. The only problem is he did not know how. His parole officer stood-him up when they had planned a meeting. He couldn’t find a job. He was depressed. Mixon was ready to go back to prison, his grandmother, if only to get a new parole officer upon his release. When he was stopped Saturday afternoon by two Oakland police officers, Mixon apparently decided prison was not where he wanted to be. He shot at the officers, killing both. Mixon then barricaded himself in his sister’s apartment and killed two more officers as they tried to arrest him.
Mixon was killed by other officers in the apartment. The police department and city officials were trying to piece together the facts and make sense of the deaths. Officers in the close-knit community wore a black mourning stripe across their shields.