Jacksonville officers cleared in two separate police shootings

Two Jacksonville Sheriff's officers have been cleared in connection to separate shootings.

New reports we’ve obtained from JSO’s Response to Resistance Review Board recommend no further action against the officers involved in a fatal shooting from last October as well as a shooting in February where the suspect was not hit with the gunfire.

During the October incident, JSO's SWAT Team was serving a high risk search warrant at a suspected drug house on Century Street in Arlington as the result of a long term drug investigation. The suspect, Jerry "Mike" Graham, had threatened a confidential informant, according to JSO. Graham was a convicted felon who police say was known to be armed and potentially violent.

SWAT forcibly entered the home after announcing their presence. Graham’s girlfriend was seen by officers, but complied with their demands. JSO says Graham then came in to the same room while holding a gun and began to raise the gun toward the officers. That drew one of the officers to fire five rounds, all of which hit Graham. He collapsed, and was declared dead at the scene.

Two women and two children were also in the home. In addition to the loaded gun Graham was holding, JSO says they found four other guns, crack cocaine, heroin, and other illegal drugs.

The Board also reviewed the February police shooting where the suspect was hit with two less-lethal rounds, but the one lethal round that was fired missed.

This incident started at the River Point Mental Health facility on Beach Boulevard, where a man left a suspicious device that JSO determined to have "all the components of an improvised explosive device", although it did not explode. Police determined Christopher Bell planted the device, and obtained a search warrant for his apartment on Plaza Road in Atlantic Beach.

While SWAT was clearing the apartments around Bell, the suspect spotted them and “yelled obscenities at the officers, displayed multiple knives and swords to the officers, and told the officers that they would have to kill him,” says the report from the Board.

Bell was barricaded in the apartment, so SWAT started to move in to the front parking lot while using an armored vehicle. A team armed with a less-lethal 40mm multi-launcher deployed from the vehicle to be the initial responders if Bell complied, while other officers remained inside to provide lethal cover if needed.

JSO says Bell suddenly charged down a staircase toward officers while “aggressively swinging a black sword-like object.” That item was later determined to be a sword sheath. Police say Bell ignored commands to stop, and the officer inside of the armored vehicle couldn’t see the team outside to know if they saw Bell rushing forward, so -- feeling that they were in danger -- that officer fired a lethal round. That round did not hit Bell. At the same time, the officers outside of the armored vehicle fired two less-lethal rounds, which connected, leading Bell to surrender.

In both cases, the Response to Resistance Review Board unanimously recommended no further action against the officers involved. The sheriff agreed with that recommendation in both cases as well, according to the Board documents we’ve obtained.

Cox Media Group