ORANGE COUNTY, Fla. – The Orange County Sheriff’s Office released bodycam footage on Tuesday that shows a deputy shooting and killing a man they said was reaching for a rifle during a raid last month.
On May 16, SWAT members raided what deputies described as a drug house located at 5614 Lejune Drive around 2:20 p.m.
Deputies said that as the SWAT team entered and tried to clear the area of danger, they ran into a man in a bedroom, who reached behind a door where a rifle was located.
A deputy then fired on the man, who was struck and later taken to the hospital. The man, later identified by sheriff’s officials as Tyrone Bartley, 32, died a short time later, officials said.
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The bodycam video shows deputies approaching the house saying, “police with a search warrant. Open the door now” before they knock in the door.
After deputies clear the living and kitchen areas, they can be seen kicking in one bedroom door before Bartley is seen opening his own door.
Shortly after, deputies can be heard saying “hands up” multiple times before unleashing a series of gunshots.
In the video, deputies said the “view from deputy #2’s body-worn camera shows Bartley reaching behind the bedroom door where a rifle was located.”
Bartley’s family and friends held a press conference on Saturday, disputing the sheriff’s office account of events.
“He did nothing wrong,” Shereem Bartley, Tyrone Bartley’s sister said at the press conference. “He was not who you guys came for that particular day, nor have you guys ever come for him on any day.”
Shereem Bartley said the home where the search warrant was served by the SWAT team is set up where the bedrooms are individual bedrooms with different numbers on each door.
Brittani Jackson, Tyrone Bartley’s girlfriend, accused the sheriff’s office of botching the raid and search warrant for “two roommates that weren’t even home.”
“They say the gun was later found behind the door. There was no gun behind the door,” Jackson said through tears at the same press conference.
The sheriff’s office said on Saturday that during the incident on May 16, deputies recovered three handguns and one rifle and nearly 370 grams of fentanyl laced cocaine. They also said that two handguns were recovered there earlier this month during a domestic violence call, but did not say which unit inside of the house was involved in those recoveries.
The Florida Department of Law Enforcement is investigating the shooting.