REPORT: Jacksonville firefighter arrested in connection to attempted carjacking in St. Augustine

UPDATE: Jacksonville fire lieutenant reassigned after reported attempted carjacking in St. Augustine

St. Augustine police arrested Jacksonville Fire and Rescue Lt. John Lopez early Sunday morning in connection with an attempted carjacking in a parking lot off St.George Street.

The victim involved in the carjacking said she has bruises on her body. She said they were inflicted by Lopez when he grabbed her while she was in her car and threw her to the ground.

"I didn’t see him until he opened up my car door," said the 24-year-old woman.

She said Lopez approached her while she was sitting in her car charging her phone.

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According to the incident report, Lopez repeatedly told her to get out of the vehicle because he was the authority.

"I didn’t really know what was happening other than I don’t know (Lopez), and that he's not with any form of security, police, fire department that I knew of at that time. He was not in uniform and that was my biggest concern," she said.

When she refused to get out, she said she was pulled from the car and slammed into the pavement so quickly that she didn’t know what was happening.

Some men, who were in the area at the time of the attack, pulled Lopez off and restrained him.

The woman said she later learned that Lopez works for Jacksonville Fire and Rescue.

"A little discouraging actually to know that the people who are employed to help us are actually not,” she said.

Randy Wyse, president of the Jacksonville Association of Firefighters, said the association hopes the public would withhold judgment until all the facts of the incident involving Lopez are brought to light.

Lopez has since been released from jail.

Records show that Lopez had been previously arrested for similar charges in 2007, but those charges were dropped.

Cox Media Group