ORLANDO, Fla. — A 12-year-old boy and a 14-year-old girl were in a shootout with deputies Tuesday night in Volusia County, arming themselves with weapons belonging to a house they had broken into.
The girl was transported to Central Florida Regional Hospital with life-threatening injuries after being shot during the incident, according to a Volusia County Sheriff’s Office release. Charges against the two are pending, VCSO said.
The children, who will not be identified in this report as the Orlando Sentinel does not release the names of juveniles, had run away from Florida United Methodist Children’s Home located in Enterprise. They were reported missing at around 5 p.m. It was also reported the boy was diabetic and in need of medication. He also hit a member of the Methodist group with a stick before leaving.
At around 7:30 p.m. witnesses reported a disturbance of glass breaking at a home located on Enterprise Osteen Road, VCSO said. The homeowner was contacted and reported that no one should be in his home. He also told officials there was “a handgun, a shotgun and an AK-47 inside, along with a large amount of ammunition.”
Deputies surrounded the home and began talking to the children. Deputies observed the girl using a baseball bat to destroy furniture, a bathtub and a toilet, said Sheriff Mike Chitwood. As deputies continued to peacefully engage the teens, the girl fired at a sheriff’s sergeant out a back patio door around 8:30 p.m. Both children fired at deputies four separate times over 35 minutes. During the time deputies tried talking the children out of the home. Soon after, the girl came out of the garage and pointed a gun at the authorities.
Deputies fired twice and wounded her. Deputies immediately moved into the garage to provide aid while separate deputies located the boy, who was holding an AK-47. After a “30-second” stand-off he surrendered, Chitwood said.
The girl was transported to CFRH for life-saving surgery. When she was in stable condition she was transferred to another hospital for further treatment. The boy was also transported to the hospital due to his diabetic condition. An investigation of the home revealed smashed furniture and an empty AK-47 banana clip.
At 11:30 p.m. Chitwood addressed the media in outrage.
“The sanctity of human life is cheap on the streets, here’s the indication, a 12-year-old and a 14-year-old have it so bad in life that they are going to defy law enforcement and engage them in a gun battle,” he said. “The more we deescalate it, the more we’re trying to get the armored vehicles out here, and pepper spray and tear gas, the more brazened they got. That they just felt that they continue to open fire so much so that they threatened to kill my sergeant and then took on my crime suppression team. Unfortunately she lost. I have no sympathy none. Anyone that says I’m an a—hole. So be it. Had any of these deputies entered that property, I’d be explaining to their husband or wife why they weren’t coming home tonight.”
Chitwood also noted that this incident was not the first time law enforcement had been involved with the 14-year-old. She was previously arrested for stealing dogs. She was later sentenced by teen court to a halfway house, which she burned down on April 10, Chitwood said. The Department of Juvenile Justice then sent her to the Florida United Methodist Children’s Home — an institution established in 1908 for “the relief, education and training of destitute, fatherless and motherless children, who may look to us for help,” FUMCH said on its website. In modern times, FUMCH takes children who experience sexual abuse, physical abuse, abandonment, drug abuse, illness or the death of a parent.
Chitwood noted that FUMCH has had numerous problems with children in the past, stating that it is “not equipped” to handle the children the Department of Juvenile Justice is handing over to them. VCSO received close to 300 calls regarding the home in 2020. On April 3, deputies arrested a 14-year-old boy from FUMCH who had left campus and beat a 52-year-old security guard, Michael Ellis, who was escorting the teen back. Ellis later died in the hospital.
“You need to be exposing the Department of Juvenile Justice. It’s a failure. It’s fraud. It’s a fake,” he said. “Deputies did everything they could tonight to de-escalate, and they almost lost their lives to a 12-year-old and a 14-year-old. If it wasn’t for their training and their supervision. Somebody would have ended up dead.”
As a standard to officer-related shootings, the Florida Department of Law Enforcement responded to the scene to conduct an investigation. The deputies involved will be temporarily placed on paid administrative leave.
