What we know about the FBI shooting of Tahiem Weeks-Cook in Nicetown-Tioga
Authorities have released few details on the circumstances behind the shooting last week. Weeks-Cook died Sunday evening.
An FBI agent shot a man while attempting to serve an arrest warrant last week in Philadelphia’s Nicetown-Tioga section.
The man, Tahiem Weeks-Cook, 22, died Sunday evening at Temple University hospital. His family described him as an auto-body mechanic who has served as a role model for his two younger brothers since their father died five years ago.
Authorities have released few details on the circumstances behind the Friday shooting. His family has said they have struggled to get information about why FBI agents were trying to arrest Weeks-Cook. Sources familiar with the investigation have said the attempted arrest was connected to a series of robberies in the region.
“I know it won’t bring my child back, but I need answers,” Weeks-Cook’s mother, Stacey Weeks, told The Inquirer this week. “They haven’t even contacted me with condolences or anything, and they killed my son.”
What happened to Tahiem Weeks-Cook?
Weeks-Cook was shot four times Friday on the 1700 block of West Venango Street after a bureau SWAT arrived to the area just before noon. The agent, whom officials have not identified, struck Weeks-Cook four times, hitting him in his stomach, chest and groin.
Following the shooting, Weeks-Cook was taken to Temple University hospital. A surgeon amputated Weeks-Cook’s right leg Saturday morning, and he died late Sunday.
A video captured by cameras at a business near the shooting scene shows the moments before the incident erupted. In the clip, Weeks-Cook can be seen leaving his apartment on Venango Street when four armed agents in camouflage equipment emerge from the back of an unmarked white van.
Weeks-Cook can be seen spotting them before running toward 17th Street as the agents pursue him. The shooting is not shown in the clip, but about a minute after Weeks-Cook and the agents run out of frame, another officer exits the white van, shuts its rear door, and heads off in the direction of Weeks-Cook and the agents.
The footage does not appear to show Weeks-Cook holding a weapon. Officials have not said whether he was armed at the time of the shooting.
The shooting is under review by the FBI’s Inspection Division, which investigates agent-involved shootings.
Why were authorities pursuing him?
Officials declined to say why they were attempting to arrest Weeks-Cook, and have not released further information, citing an ongoing investigation.
Sources familiar with the investigation, however, told The Inquirer Monday that the FBI was after Weeks-Cook in connection with a series of recent armed robberies at 7-Eleven stores in the region.
On the day he was shot, Upper Southampton Township police filed felony charges against Weeks-Cook, with counts including robbery, conspiracy, and terroristic threats. Those charges were in connection with a July 30 robbery of a 7-Eleven at 932 State Road, court records indicate.
According to court documents, authorities linked Weeks-Cook to that robbery by tracing cell phone location data from the Bucks County store to an apartment on the 1600 block of West Venango Street.
The FBI last week offered a reward for information about the Upper Southampton incident, and said they believed it was connected to at least seven other 7-Eleven robberies in Philadelphia, Delaware, and Montgomery Counties. Those incidents each involved two to three suspects, with one waiting by the door, and the others confronting the store’s clerk, brandishing a gun, and taking money from the register.
Paul Hetznecker, an attorney for Weeks-Cook’s family, has called on the FBI to provide a full account of the investigation as soon as possible.
Has Weeks-Cook’s family gotten any answers?
Stacey Weeks, Weeks-Cook’s mother, told The Inquirer Saturday that she has had trouble getting information from authorities about what led to her son’s shooting. Hetznecker has said that the family has heard concerning information from neighbors who said they witnessed the shooting, including that Weeks-Cook was unarmed.
“The information that the family has provided is extremely troubling,” Hetznecker said. “I have grave concerns about the independence of any investigation conducted by the FBI without some sort of independent inquiry.”
Weeks told The Inquirer Monday that she feels the bureau used “unnecessary force” against her son.
“But they won’t talk to me, and they won’t tell me anything,” she said. “I don’t even know why.”
Weeks-Cook’s girlfriend, Trezjure Fielding, declined to comment Monday, saying only that she was “devastated” by his death.
Hetznecker said he hoped answers would come in an “expedited fashion.” Weeks, meanwhile, remains determined to keep the final promise she made to her son.
“I whispered in my child’s ear yesterday,” she said Monday, “‘I’m going to get justice.’”