SEATTLE -- Police fired a bullet directly into one of the chambers of a gun wielded by an angry man as they shot him to death in a confrontation at a bus stop, authorities said.

The man never fired his gun, but the fluke police shot showed he was aiming it, said Deputy Police Chief Clark S. Kimerer.

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"Physically, I believe, it is impossible to conclude anything other than the fact that the suspect was pointing a weapon directly at the officers," Kimerer said.

Police said the 18-year-old man became belligerent after a fight with his girlfriend on Tuesday and raised his gun at officers responding to a call from a concerned storekeeper. Authorities said they ordered the man to put his gun down, but he refused.

Officers fired a total of about four shots from their .40-caliber Glock handguns, authorities said. One of their bullets entered one of the chambers of the man's .38-caliber revolver, shoving the bullet inside backwards, said Kimerer.

"I've not seen anything quite like that in my 24 years," Kimerer told the Seattle Post-Intelligencer.

The man's name was being withheld because family had not been notified, according to the King County medical examiner's office.

Both officers were placed on paid leave, a standard procedure in shootings involving law enforcement personnel.