The mother of the man shot by Miami police outside a home near Liberty City said she called 911 to keep her son safe because he was high on drugs and she did not want others to hurt him.

Denise Armstrong told NBC 6 South Florida she was trying to protect her son Donald Armstrong when she called the cops Thursday afternoon. Instead, at least one officer shot at him about a dozen times after he would not comply with their commands, according to police and witness cellphone videos.

“Don’t kill my child,” Armstrong said she told officers before the near-fatal encounter.

Around 2 p.m., police said they got a 911 call about a man “possibly high on narcotics causing a disturbance” at 5703 Northwest Seventh Court in the Model City neighborhood of Miami, near Liberty City. When officers arrived, police said they “encountered an aggressive subject who was armed with a sharp object, and actively refusing to comply with officers’ commands.”

One of the witness cellphone videos, obtained by the Miami Herald, shows officers confronting a man at gunpoint who is standing on the front porch of a house. He is armed with either a knife or a screwdriver.

“Shoot! Shoot in the heart,” he yells at officers as his mother tries to speak with him, according to the video footage. During the tense moments, officers are heard ordering others to move away from him. One officer is seen grabbing a person by the arm and directing them away from the house.

Armstrong then lifts his white shirt and an officer shoots him with a stun gun, but he rips the probes from his body. When an officer hits him with a stun gun for a second time, he falls forward, while waving his left arm with the object in his hand.

As Armstrong gets closer to the officers, at least one shoots at him multiple times, including after he hits the ground, around 2:45 p.m., about 45 minutes after the 911 call was made.

“They shot him dead,” a witness is heard saying in the video.

Miami Fire Rescue paramedics took Armstrong in critical condition to Jackson Memorial Hospital. His condition was not immediately known Friday.

Police say the officers shot the man to keep everyone safe. They have not confirmed his name.

“This individual failed to communicate with any of our verbal commands,” police spokesman Freddie Cruz said Thursday near the scene of the shooting. “…The individual still had that sharp object in his hand when our officers did make that determination to fire their firearms for their safety and everyone’s safety.”

Miami Police Department’s Internal Affairs Division and the Florida Department of Law Enforcement are investigating. It could take months or a year before the departments conclude their probes, according to the agencies.

This developing story will be updated when more information is available.

Miami Herald staff writers Devoun Cetoute, David Goodhue and Grethel Aguila contributed to this report.