They were closing in on Juan Castellanos after getting 911 calls from a West Central Fresno neighborhood.
Action News talked to several witnesses who each saw a different chapter of the story, including the woman who got police out to the scene.
But in the end, there was only one witness to the shooting -- the officer who pulled the trigger.
"There was a pool of blood just going down this way and he was lying right here," said Greg Eads.
The search for a carjacking suspect ended on Eads' street early Friday morning, just steps from his driveway.
"I was sound asleep and awoke to four or five consecutive gunshots," Eads said. "It woke me up. They were loud."
Police said Castellanos put a sawed-off shotgun in the face of an undercover officer, but the officer shot first, hitting Castellanos in the chest.
"The suspect staggered a few feet, fell to the ground and actually had the shotgun strapped to his chest and fell on top of that shotgun," said Police Chief Jerry Dyer.
The incident started in front of a Central Fresno apartment complex, about six miles away.
Police said Castellanos carjacked a man and made him drive all over town for almost two hours.
The victim finally broke free in Eads' neighborhood and started knocking on doors for help.
Christine Vail said it was close to midnight when she heard pounding. "It just really scared me," she said. "I didn't answer the door. I didn't even look out the window. I called 911 just right away."
Minutes later, police had their confrontation with Castellanos.
The flashing police lights attracted curious neighbors like Eads, and Fresno's new Independent Police Auditor Eddie Aubrey. "I surveyed the location, saw the follow-up interviews and monitored the process," he said.
Aubrey is still investigating the shooting, but Chief Dyer said he's seen all he needs to know what happened. "This was a matter of our detective simply trying to survive," said Dyer.
It's the second officer-involved shooting the police auditor has had to investigate in two months on the job.
He expects the process to take a few months.
