'You guys need to send backup now!' 911 audio from FBI shooting in Florida is released

Mario Ariza, South Florida Sun Sentinel

FORT LAUDERDALE, Fla. — A woman huddles in the bathroom with her daughter and dog, frantically calling 911 as shots ring out. She thinks she might faint, she tells the dispatcher.

“You guys need to send backup. These people are killing out here!” another woman shouts at the 911 dispatcher.

The 911 audio released Tuesday by the Broward Sheriff’s Office gives testament to the bedlam and chaos of the events that occurred early on the morning of Feb. 2, when two FBI agents were killed in Sunrise and three others wounded by David Lee Huber, a suspect in a federal child pornography investigation.

For the FBI, it was the deadliest day for their agency since 9/11. But for residents, it was a terrifying wake-up call. Police records released along with the audio show that at least two people, a couple, were evacuated from their apartment.

“I’m sleeping and I’m just hearing boom boom boom, and then I popped up and I’m hearing again boom boom boom boom, and we don’t know where its coming,” one woman tells a dispatcher, exhaustion and concern evident in her voice.

The audio recordings give a voice to that day’s deadly events.

One woman said she could see a police officer running through the Water Terrace Apartment Complex where Huber lived. Yelling is clear in the background of her recording.

“Some maniac must be over there,” she says to the dispatcher. “Oh my God, what is going on here? This is a quiet neighborhood. Oh my God.”

Dispatch records further flesh out the timeline surrounding the events of the shootout. Although sections of the report were withheld for investigative purposes, the reports show police frantically trying to respond to the incident.

“Bring the bear cat to the entrance,” an operator says at 6:11 am, seven minutes after the first reports of shots fired. A bear cat is an armored vehicle used by SWAT teams in the region.

“Need a team with a bear cat,” an operator relays to the wider communications network some 30 seconds afterward.

It’s unclear when the armored vehicle arrives. Photographs from the scene show that it was driven into Huber’s apartment, possibly in an attempt to rescue the two fallen FBI agents.

At 6:29 a.m., 25 minutes after the first call, an operator announces: “Do not fire towards the front. They are going to let in smoke.”

It’s not clear when the responding police departments managed to retrieve the bodies of the fallen FBI agents. At 7:05 a.m., the standoff with Huber continued, according to the dispatch report.

“No windows breached. Suspect still possibly contained inside,” it says.

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