The shooting of Eleanor Bumpurs by the New York Police Department occurred on October 29, 1984. The police were present to enforce a city-ordered eviction of Bumpurs, an elderly, disabled African American woman, from her public housing apartment in the Bronx. In requesting NYPD assistance, housing authority workers told police that Bumpurs was emotionally disturbed, had threatened to throw boiling lye, and was using a knife to resist eviction. When Bumpurs refused to open the door, police broke in. In the struggle to subdue her, one officer fatally shot Bumpurs twice with a 12-gauge shotgun.