Salazar was resting in the Silver Dollar Bar after the protest became violent. According to a witness, "Ruben Salazar had just sat down to sip a quiet beer at the bar, away from the madness in the street, when a deputy fired a tear gas projectile" at a crowd which went into the interior of the bar, hitting Salazar in the head and killing him instantly. The sheriff's deputy fired a 10-inch wall-piercing type of tear gas round from a tear gas gun of the type intended for barricade situations, rather than the type of tear gas round designed to be fired directly at people (which produces a plume of tear gas smoke). The deputy was found to have mistakenly loaded the wrong type of tear gas round, as the two types of cylinders were nearly identical.