Surveillance video shows JSO-involved shooting, wrongful death suit filed

JACKSONVILLE, Fla. — New surveillance video reveals a different perspective of an officer-involved shooting about a year ago that killed Michael Hughes, 32.

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It started as a domestic dispute at the Quality Inn on Youngerman Circle on March 30, 2021. Now Hughes’ family attorney has filed a lawsuit against the Jacksonville Sheriff’s Office which claims the officer was unjustified in the shooting.

“A domestic dispute should not result in a death sentence,” Marwan Porter said. “This is real for this family and they’ll have to deal with this tragedy and it’s unnecessary. But it will not go unaddressed.”

The family and Porter held a news conference last year in reference to the bodycam footage released by JSO.

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You can see a struggle between Hughes and an officer’s inside the hotel room, but at one point the camera falls off the officer and you can only hear audio.

According to the report, Hughes grabbed the officers’ taser and shot him with it. Shortly after, two shots are fired at Hughes inside.

The new footage released by Porter Wednesday shows what happened after the struggle continued outside the hotel. Porter said Hughes was unarmed at this point.

“Michael goes toward Officer Blanchard who moves out the way and steps away from Michael. Michael then goes towards Defendant J.H. Wing who shoots Michael Hughes three additional times,” the lawsuit reads. “The Officer knowingly, intentionally and unreasonably pursued and killed Michael Hughes. Michael’s actions did not pose a danger to any person as he had already been shot twice and was unarmed, and did not warrant the firing of three additional bullets.”

According to the JSO report, the officer thought Hughes still had the taser.

“I believed the suspect was aggressively coming toward me...I believed the suspect still had my Taser and was now rapidly advancing towards me.”

“My son was a good son. He had children that he loved and children that he took care of the best he good,” Timothy Hughes, Michael’s father, said. “Seeing that just makes me angry. Makes me angry someone could do that to someone who’s unarmed.”

Porter said the officer in question was cleared of the shooting.

Action News Jax reached out to the Jacksonville Sheriff’s Office for a response. We will update this story when we hear back.

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