Jacksonville police: Teen shoots self in leg, initially tells officers he was hit in drive-by

JACKSONVILLE, Fla. — The Jacksonville Sheriff's Office is investigating after they say a 17-year-old boy shot himself in the leg on Thursday night.

Officers responded at 6:50 p.m. to Cliff's Bar and Grill on Monument Road to reports that a man had been shot.

No incident took place at the restaurant, JSO Lt. Steve Mullen said.

When officers arrived, they found a 17-year-old male lying on the sidewalk with a gunshot wound to the leg

The victim initially told police he had been shot by a car driving past a playground at the Hillwood Pointe apartment complex on McCormick Boulevard. Mullen said that story didn't check out with witnesses and evidence.

Further investigation revealed he and other juveniles were together at a different address in the Cobblestone neighborhood and the teen's gunshot wound was actually self-inflicted, Mullen said.

"The officers did a good job of interviewing, getting down to the facts and breaking the story down," Mullen said. "That's important to do because we don't want to be looking for a car all night long or for weeks. It takes a lot of man-hours, it takes us away from doing other things."

When the shooting happened, the teen and other juveniles were in a car, at a residence in the Cobblestone neighborhood. The teen who shot himself was able to run about four to five blocks to Cliff's Bar and Grill before calling police.

"I don't know what they were doing specifically, but they shouldn't have a gun and they shouldn't have been shooting around," Mullen said.

Mullen said there doesn't appear to be a suspect at large at this time. Police have the car the juveniles were in at the time of the shooting and are working to recover the weapon.

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