Video released Friday shows the moment from earlier this month when a Florida deputy fatally shoots an armed man, whose brother is nearby and bleeding to death after an altercation at an Orlando hotel.
Siblings Dylan Michael Jimenez, 21, and Bryan Matthew Richardson, 28, both died following the incident, the Orange County Sheriff’s Office said.
The sheriff’s office released body camera video of deputies responding on Aug. 6 to a 12:30 p.m. shooting outside the Orlando hotel, where they found Jimenez wounded from having been shot.
The video begins when a deputy is speaking to a man who says he’s a paramedic and is treating a wounded man on the ground who is shot on the right side of his chest.
The deputy can be heard in the video telling the paramedic that they’re going to treat the wounded man by putting a chest seal on him. The deputy then instructs the paramedic to put the injured man on his back and to open his airway.
Shouts of “he has a gun, he has a gun” are then heard on the video. Also heard is someone shouting that the person with the gun is pointing it at people.
The deputy then moves toward a man and orders him to “drop the gun,” while a second deputy appears to struggle with the man’s left hand. The video then shows the unidentified deputy firing several rounds at the nearby man. The wounded man is then seen in the video collapsing by a pickup truck.
Both Richardson and Jimenez were pronounced dead at the hospital, police have said.
Prior to deputies arriving outside of the hotel, officials said, Jimenez and Richardson had an altercation with a third man outside of the hotel. Jimenez and the third man, who was not identified, shot each other. The brothers then ran to the north side of the hotel where Richardson fell to the ground. The man who allegedly shot Richardson survived his injuries, police said.
Orange County Sheriff John Mina, in an introduction to the video of the shooting, said his office is “committed to transparency and believes it is critical to maintaining accountability and enhancing trust between this agency and the public.”
The Florida Department of Law Enforcement will conduct an independent investigation, Mina said. The deputy who fired his weapon was placed on paid administrative leave, Mina said.
He has been with the sheriff’s office since 2018, agency officials said.
No one with the Florida Department of Law Enforcement could be reached Monday.
Attorney Mark NeJame is representing the family of the deceased brothers. He credited Sheriff Mina for releasing the shooting video “on his own volition.”
He said, however, it appears the deputy who fatally shot Richardson “clearly used excessive force and overreacted.”
NeJame said that, according to witnesses, Richardson was protecting his wounded brother and the crowd near Jimenez because a gunman was at large.
NeJame said Richardson had just witnessed his brother get shot was most likely in shock. He added that it’s unknown if the deputy in the video had known Richardson was armed prior to his fatal shooting.
The shooting was an “unnecessary use of violence against someone who had already been victimized, Bryan,” NeJame said.
Source: | This article originally belongs to Nbcnews.com
