The Arizona Daily Star, Tucson
TUCSON, Ariz. — The jail inmate shot and killed at a Tucson hospital in October had slipped a wrist restraint and lunged at a corrections officer in a bid to take her gun, authorities say.
The inmate, Nathan Peru, 31, had been left alone with one of two corrections officers who were watching him at Banner University Medical Center South after one of them went to get him food, according to a news release from Oro Valley police. The agency is leading the investigation into the shooting by the Pima Regional Critical Incident Team, which probes local officer-involved shootings.
Once alone, Peru lunged at the corrections officer, Caitlin Acosta, trying to grab her gun. Acosta shot Peru during the struggle, the release said.
Peru died despite life-saving efforts, the release said.
Acosta, who has worked for the Pima County Sheriff’s Department for five years, suffered minor injuries. No one else was wounded in the shooting.
Peru had been taken to the hospital the day before the shooting. He was being held on charges of two counts of sexual conduct with a minor, theft and burglary, the release said.
Peru was arrested in the March 2024 death of his daughter, whom he initially told investigators had drowned when she fell in the tub while taking a bath, court records show.
An autopsy concluded her death was a homicide. But it also found blunt force injuries and evidence of sexual assault, court records said.
On the day of the girl’s death, Peru told officers he was outside his home near North Flowing Wells and West Wetmore roads and heard a loud “thump.” When he went inside to investigate the noise, he saw his daughter “face down in the bathtub,” court records say.
The sheriff’s department is conducting a separate administrative investigation into the shooting.
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