In the three months between being shot in his neck by someone in the street and being killed by police Sunday, the well-known community activist Tyree “Colion” Moorehead was in turmoil.

Known for spray painting “No Shoot Zone” hundreds of times across Baltimore, Moorehead, 46, was driven out of the Biddle Street neighborhood where he was shot and moved in with his father in West Baltimore, a close friend said. The move, plus lingering trauma from his injury and a recent stint in jail, upended Moorehead’s life. He fell into a state of anguish, said Eric Grinage, his friend and fellow “No Shoot Zone” activist.

On Sunday afternoon, police shot and killed Moorehead after responding to calls that he was attacking a woman with a knife. Cellphone video of his death spread on social media. Now, some friends and fellow activists are left to wonder what provoked him and whether officers could have stepped in without opening fire. Police encountered him one block away from his “No Shoot Zone #1.”

“The behavior yesterday was totally out of character. I’ve never known him to be physical,” said Christina Flowers, an advocate for the city’s homeless population who performed community work alongside Moorehead.

She left balloons Monday at the scene of his shooting on North Fulton and West Lafayette avenues. A teddy bear held a note with the words “King Tyree.”

“I don’t know what triggered it or got him to that point of aggression,” Flowers said. “Whatever it was, it definitely had him in a state of trauma.”

In the cellphone video from Sunday, Moorehead appears to struggle with someone on the street when a police SUV pulls up. An officer exits the vehicle yelling for Moorehead to get on the ground, and it appears that he does, but the officer soon after fired more than a dozen shots. In a news release, police said Moorehead was ordered to the ground and that, while holding a knife, he “went to the ground on top of the female.”

Kwame Rose, a community activist and Baltimore musician who knew Moorehead, said he spoke to the family after police showed them the body camera footage. According to Rose, the footage shows an officer firing 12 rounds, reloading, and then firing an additional shot.

Rose said Moorehead’s father was shaken up after viewing the footage, which he said showed Moorehead dropping down to the ground before being “shot like a dog.”

On social media, Moorehead wrote about leaving Baltimore under pressure from the police. He described them as an opposing force that harassed him. He also posted about the upcoming birthday of his twin sons and made vague threats alluding to their mother. She has twice sought protective orders from the courts. Interviews, social media posts and court records reveal a man whose behavior was increasingly erratic.

Last November, Moorehead pleaded guilty to carrying a knife with the intent to cause injury. In a police report from that incident, officers wrote that they encountered Moorehead at night wearing a T-shirt and boxer shorts and carrying a knife along Cedonia Avenue in Northeast Baltimore.

“Officers on scene attempted multiple times to get Mr. Moorehead to drop the knife,” Officer Marcus Langley wrote. “Mr. Moorehead, at one point during the encounter, stated ‘If you tase me, I’ll chop yo ass up.’”

A driver came to a stop sign and Moorehead spoke to him through the passenger window. Police ordered the car on, and as the driver pulled away, Moorehead bashed the window with his knife, according to the police report. Officers tased and handcuffed him. Moorehead pleaded guilty to the knife charge and was sentenced to 75 days in prison.

Eight months earlier, in March 2021, his ex-girlfriend and the mother of his twin sons sought protection from the courts, writing that he has shown up to her home, banged on the door, threatened and stalked her. She alleged Moorehead had a knife with him.

“He has stressed me out to the point where I’m seeing a therapist and taking depression pills,” the woman wrote.

She could not be reached for comment; The Baltimore Banner generally does not identify victims of alleged domestic violence.

A Baltimore district judge granted her a temporary protective order. In a final ruling, the order was denied. The reasons for the denial were not immediately clear. Court records only indicate the judge found “petitioner could not meet required burden of proof.”

The woman had previously sought a protection order from Moorehead two years earlier. That petition, too, was denied.

Another woman filed for a peace order against Moorehead early last year, writing that he had threatened her and her roommate. The request was denied because she did not show up to court.

After he was shot in August, Moorehead felt he was being targeted by law enforcement and intimidated by his neighbors out of living in the Biddle Street area. No one has been charged in that shooting, according to police. After being released from the hospital, Moorehead told a Fox45 Baltimore reporter the bullets “fell out of the sky.”

He was also scheduled for a jury trial at the end of this month in Baltimore County on assault and weapons charges.

Meanwhile, he continued his activism, posting about the 261st “No Shoot Zone,” which was spray painted to honor a man who was shot dead.

Grinage, for one, has questioned the police department’s account of the shooting.

“Our leader has been assassinated,” he said in a Facebook video. “Straight up assassinated, there’s no way to sugarcoat it.”

Grinage told The Baltimore Banner that Moorehead had no intentions of being killed by police, despite some online commenters suggesting his death was a “suicide by cop” incident. In video footage of the shooting uploaded to social media, Moorehead can be seen getting on the ground after being ordered to do so by police, moments before he was shot.

“How can it be suicide by cop if he surrendered?” Grinage said.

Grinage also questioned the police’s description of Moorehead being on top of an unidentified female who he was trying to stab, saying that, if that were the case, she also would have been hit by gunfire. Police can be heard on the video discharging at least 13 rounds during the shooting.

The Maryland Attorney General’s Office said its investigators would review the case and likely release the name of the officer who shot Moorehead within 48 hours, unless it deems there is a safety threat. It said the officer’s body camera was active at the time of the incident and the video will be released “in accordance with the Baltimore Police Department and Independent investigations Division policies.”

In the wake of Moorehead’s death, Grinage said he is dealing not only with his own emotions, but other members of the “No Shoot Zone” initiative who are struggling with the loss of their leader.

“This is rocking the entire city,” Grinage said. “You can see it on peoples’ faces as you walk down the street.”

This story has been updated.

bconarck@thebaltimorebanner.com