KENOSHA (REUTERS) - Wisconsin Justice Department investigators recovered a knife from the driver's side floorboard of the car into which Mr Jacob Blake Jr, was leaning when he was shot in the back by a police officer three days ago, the state attorney general said on Wednesday (Aug 26).

Attorney General Josh Kaul also told a news conference that Mr Blake, 29, a Black man whose wounding by police has left him paralysed and the city of Kenosha, Wisconsin, torn by civil strife, had admitted to investigators that he had a knife in his possession at the time.

A search of Mr Blake's vehicle turned up no other weapons, Mr Kaul said.

According to an initial account of events leading up to Sunday's shooting in Kenosha, Mr Kaul said police confronted Mr Blake when they were called to the home of a woman who reported that her boyfriend was present without her permission.

During the incident, Mr Kaul said, police tried to arrest Mr Blake, using a Taser stun gun in an attempt to subdue him but failed.

Mr Blake, according to the attorney general, then walked around his vehicle, opened the driver's side door and leaned forward, as officer Rusten Shesky, clutching onto Mr Blake's shirt, fired his weapon seven times at Mr Blake's back.

Mr Kaul said no other police officers fired their weapons.