Teresa StepzinskiJacksonville Florida Times-Union
A barrage of gunfire punctuates St. Johns County Sheriff's Office body camera footage showing the circ*mstances leading to deputies killing a burglary suspect they said was armed with a handgun at a popular Nocatee park crowded with hundreds of children, parents and athletic officials.
Dustin Alan Rush died after he was shot by St. Johns County sheriff's deputies about 8:35 a.m Nov. 4 amid multiple youth sporting events at Davis Park near Ponte Vedra High School. The shooting ended a chase by deputies linked to a burglary to a storage unit facility earlier that morning.
The Sheriff's Office body camera video released Friday does not show the actual shooting or the suspect armed with the gun. The footage only shows the events of the pursuit leading to the park and the immediate aftermath of the shooting.
Sheriff Robert Hardwick previously has said the shooting happened when deputies confronted Rush in a parking lot near the park's soccer fields where a youth tournament was being held. Nearby, multiple activities were going on at the high school, he said.
"The suspect is running through the parking lot with a firearm … He takes basically a defensive posture between two vehicles at the end of the parking lot. …. And deputies engaged the suspect," Hardwick told reporters during a briefing following the shooting.
A myriad of rapid-fire gunshots can be heard on the body camera video.
Hardwick has said it was unclear whether Rush had fired at the deputies. The shooting remains under investigation by the Sheriff's Office Major Crimes Unit.
Deputies recovered a handgun they said Rush had when the shooting happened after he refused their repeated commands to stop and surrender, Hardwick said. He emphasized that deputies acted to protect the children and others at the park and high school.
After the shooting, Rush can be seen lying on his stomach — not moving — on the ground between a parked pickup truck and a sport-utility vehicle. A deputy handcuffs him.
A dispatcher is heard announcing on the police radio "Signal 7," which is the law enforcement radio code for a deceased person. But about a minute later, a deputy standing over Rush radios that he is "still breathing." Other deputies can be heard saying Rush was shot in the head.
After standing over him for a while discussing among themselves, deputies finally can be seen administering emergency medical aid to Rush until paramedics arrive and take over.
Rush, who had turned 42 that day, was flown to a Clay County trauma center and later died, the Sheriff's Office said.
No injuries were reported to children or spectators at the park, nor at the neighboring high school where students were participating in a variety of activities, Hardwick said.
The shooting came at the end of a pursuit by sheriff's deputies following a burglary about three hours earlier at a storage unit facility. About 5:40 a.m., deputies responded to a report of a burglary in progress at a storage unit facility off Palm Valley Road roughly 5 miles from Davis Park.
The Sheriff's Office said that deputies took a 37-year-old woman whom they identified as Crystal Lynn O'Neal into custody after finding her with burglary tools at the storage facility. O'Neal subsequently was accused of a total of 16 charges ranging from possession of burglary tools to burglary, larceny and damage to property/criminal mischief, according to St. Johns County jail inmate records.
After arresting her, deputies began searching for a second suspect — identified as Rush — who had fled in a pickup truck before they arrived at the storage facility.
St. Johns Sheriff's Deputy Taylor Parker located Rush behind the wheel of the pickup truck, which was parked beneath the Palm Valley Bridge. Making contact with him, she opens the driver's side door. She repeatedly orders him to get out and a struggle ensues between them, the bodycam footage shows.
Rush can be heard saying "What's going on?" during the struggle. Taylor backs away and deploys her Taser. Rush cries out "Ouch" then slams close the driver's door. Parker then breaks out the truck's window and Rush speeds away with her in pursuit.
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Followed by deputies, Rush sped down the road leading to Davis Park and Ponte Vedra High School. At that point, Parker used her patrol car in a PIT maneuver that caused the pickup to crash into a shallow retention pond, according to dashboard camera video.
Rush jumped out of the pickup truck and ran toward the soccer fields, which is not shown in the released videos, where children were playing before a crowd of spectators.
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Taylor ran after him. But before she reaches him, and with a building blocking her view of him, a barrage of gunfire erupts. She then reaches the shooting scene, where Rush is on the ground, according to the video.
The Sheriff's Office has identified the deputies involved in the shooting as Cpl. J. Carballosa and Deputy D. Delay. Parker didn't fire her weapon, according to the Sheriff's Office.
Times-Union Metro Editor Scott Butler contributed to this report.
