Police Brutality / Individual record
Curtis Smith
The Washington Post's Fatal Force database records Curtis Smith in a fatal on-duty police shooting on 2015-08-25 in West Chester, PA. Individual circumstances and legal outcome require case-specific review.
- Record ID
- PB-249
- Incident date
- August 25, 2015
- Outcome
- Fatal
- Location
- West Chester, PA
- Agency
- Chester County Sheriff's Office
- Category
- Fatal on-duty police shooting
- Age (reported)
- 34
What happened
Curtis Smith, 34, was killed by a Chester County sheriff's deputy at the Justice Center in West Chester, Pennsylvania, on August 25, 2015. Authorities said Smith entered the courthouse lobby carrying a knife and slashed a deputy in the hand or arm. Another deputy fired at Smith, who was taken to a hospital and pronounced dead. The courthouse was locked down, and the injured deputy received medical treatment. Smith had previously been arrested in an incident at the White House, but that background is not itself evidence about the immediate threat in the courthouse. Contemporary reporting documents the alleged knife assault and responding gunfire; the reviewed source does not establish later litigation or a separate criminal finding regarding the deputy.
Investigation & findings
Individual legal and investigative outcome not yet reviewed.
Washington Post Fatal Force v2; 2015–2024
Source record details
- Source incident ID
- 773
- Race code in source
- B
- Race source method
- not_available
- Gender (source)
- male
- Armed status (source)
- knife
- Flee status (source)
- not
- Agency IDs (source)
- 746
Sources & records
- Primary source
- Additional source
- Methodology and national police killings trackingMapping Police Violence · Dataset/methodology
- Fatal Force v2 — fatal on-duty police shootings, 2015–2024The Washington Post · Dataset