Sheriff’s bodycam footage shows teenage ‘Bonnie & Clyde’ shooting at Florida deputies
Volusia County Sheriff Mike Chitwood released bodycam video from a standoff and shootout with two armed runaway teens Tuesday night at a Deltona home that ended when deputies shot one of the suspects, a 14-year-old girl.
The footage shows one of his deputies urging fellow cops to take “hard cover” as the two runaways, the girl and a 12-year-old boy, fired at them from a shotgun and an AK-47.
As the deputy seeks shelter behind what Chitwood called “the best tree in Volusia County far as I’m concerned,” he calls out, “everyone make sure you have hard cover.”
Then, the nine-minute video, which mixes black and white, color and aerial footage, reveals some of went down in east-central Florida.
“We got movement,” the deputy says.
The footage captures a barrage of gunfire and, ultimately, a deputy firing a shot at the girl as she walks out of the garage of a home on Enterprise Osteen Road with a shotgun in her hand. She levels it at the deputies. The Miami Herald is not naming the pair due to their ages
At a news conference posted to the Volusia County Sheriff’s Office’s social media accounts, Chitwood praised his deputies for showing initial restraint despite the severity of the situation.
“They took multiple multiple rounds,” Chitwood said at the 42-minute conference. ... One banana clip was empty from the AK-47. I know from the radio transmissions that a 12-year-old opened fire on us. I know that the 14-year-old opened fire on us with a shotgun and then walked out and threatened one of my sergeants and told him she was going to kill him. And we didn’t return fire. But after she came out of the garage, hey, there was nothing left that we could do. We had to do what we had to do.”
Chitwood described the teens as “Bonnie & Clyde,” Click Orlando reported, referring to the Great Depression-era bank robbers who were killed in a police ambush at ages 23 and 25 in 1934. He also said deputies tried to de-escalate the situation before bullets flew their way.
“They almost lost their lives to a 12-year-old and a 14-year-old,” Sheriff Chitwood said. “If it wasn’t for their training and their supervision … Somebody would have ended up dead.”
According to deputies, the teens ran from Enterprise’s Florida United Methodist Children’s Home, which is about a mile and a half from the Deltona house that sheriff’s deputies say they broke into and from where they grabbed several of the homeowner’s weapons to use against officers.
The juveniles face charges of attempted first-degree murder of a law enforcement officer and armed burglary.
The girl had surgery for her wounds and was in stable condition, according to the sheriff’s office.
The Florida Department of Law Enforcement is investigating and the eight deputies involved are on standard, temporary paid administrative leave, according to Chitwood.
