Family of man killed by BSO deputies in psychiatric hospital releases video, seeks answers
Almost three years after her son was shot and killed by sheriff’s deputies in a hospital psychiatric ward hallway, Angela Randall said the only information she’s received from police and prosecutors was that her son was dead.
The family has requested police reports, body camera videos, even a Florida Department of Law Enforcement report on potential criminal wrongdoing by three deputies who fired their weapons at the facility in Tamarac. It was completed two years ago.
None of their requests have been fulfilled, they said.
“We want justice for my son and we want answers,” Randall said. “I’ve only talked to one detective since this happened and that was one-and-a-half days after it happened.”
On Thursday, Randall and her attorneys tried to force the hand of law enforcement by releasing an unedited 53-minute video of Jarvis Randall’s fatal encounter with Broward Sheriff’s deputies that differs from the original police narrative on some points.
Police claimed Jarvis Randall, 30 at the time of his death, was armed with an “edged glass weapon.” His attorneys say it was a piece of shattered plastic that covered an overhead light. Police said Randall was displaying “aggressive threatening behavior.” While Randall is clearly agitated in the video, he’s actually in a separate room from deputies most of the time, with no one else in sight and no one in any apparent danger.
And during the fatal encounter that comes about halfway through the video, police breach a closed door to get to Randall, then fire bean bag bullets at him. At first he runs away from them, trying to get out through doors at the other end of the hall. When that doesn’t work, clearly frightened, he runs back toward the deputies, one of whom is armed with a long rifle.
Shots are fired and smoke can been seen in the video. Then Jarvis Randall is on the ground in front of the doors, his body still. Though most of the encounter is clear, the actual shooting is obscured from the camera by the bodies of police officers. The video was obtained by the family through University Hospital and Medical Center in Tamarac.
“He’s in a hospital. This is not a criminal call by any stretch,” said Bakari Sellers, a civil rights attorney and frequent CNN commentator who is representing the Randall family. “All they had to do after they fired the bean bags was close the door.”
Said attorney Michael Bernstein: “He was showered with bullets.”
The emergency room doctor who pronounced Randall’s death said in his medical report that the multiple gunshot wounds suffered by Jarvis Randall were “too numerous to count.” Police said they were called by hospital workers who claimed Jarvis Randall was threatening himself and others.
The family filed a lawsuit in Broward Circuit Court in November seeking damages. It names three of the officers who fired weapons, Christian Silva, Robert O’Dor and Mitchell Machado, as defendants. Also on the defendants list, Broward Sheriff Gregory Tony and University Hospital and Medical Center, where the shooting took place.
The three named officers were placed on a brief administrative leave during an administrative review but returned to duty a few weeks after the shooting.
The lawsuit, which was transferred to federal court in April, claims that Jarvis Randall’s medical records show he was on a bevy of drugs ranging from nicotine to lorazepam, a drug used to calm anxiety attacks. Also in his system at the time of his death was prazosin, risperidone, sertraline, divalproex, sodium, fluoxetine, ibuprofem and a drug used to treat mental mood disorders called haloperidol.
Most requests by the Miami Herald on Thursday for information into Randall’s death investigation were not met. FDLE spokeswoman Gretl Plessinger said the case was still active, its findings were sent to the Broward State Attorney in June of 2019 and that her office wouldn’t comment. Broward State Attorney’s office spokeswoman Paula McMahon also refused to comment, saying the case remained open.
Broward Sheriff Gregory Tony released a statement saying his officers tried to de-escalate the situation before being left with no choice but to use lethal force. Tony said any internal affairs investigation is stalled until after the state attorney makes a decision. He called the shooting “tragic.”
“It leaves a hole in the hearts of family members and loved ones,” the sheriff said. “I also know that no law enforcement officer ever wants to be in a situation where they are forced to take a life.”
The Randall family’s frustrations were only complicated by the pandemic. All BSO shootings go before a grand jury. And grand juries that were suspended in March 2020 only began to meet again last month.
The host of unanswered questions are long, say Angela Randall’s attorneys. And they begin soon after Randall checked himself in at Plantation General Hospital on Nov. 20, 2018, Bernstein said. Angela Randall said when her son called her in Atlanta that day to say he wasn’t feeling right, she told him to go to the hospital.
Bernstein said records obtained through the hospital show that Jarvis Randall was soon Baker Acted, or involuntarily committed, at the Plantation hospital, a move that allowed them to transfer him to the University Hospital psychiatric ward in Tamarac.
What’s still unclear: Why Jarvis Randall remained in the hospital for at least five days after the 72-hour window closed which allows hospitals to hold a patient involuntarily. Angela Randall said her son’s sister visited him at the hospital and brought him clothing. But she wasn’t permitted to see him. She told her mother that her brother wanted to get out of the hospital and attend the funeral of their father, Angela Randall’s ex-husband.
Angela Randall said her son grew up an extroverted kid who loved music, sports and drawing, in her Fort Lauderdale home. He wanted to become a tattoo artist. A nurse for decades, Angela Randall said Jarvis never displayed any type of emotional instability as a child, that she noticed.
That changed in August 2016, she said, when Jarvis Randall returned to her Atlanta home after an eight-year prison stint in Florida on burglary charges. Angela Randall said she noticed it almost immediately, when they went to a mall and Jarvis said he wanted to go home because the crowd was too large.
She said over the next few months her son tried to hide his feelings, but she picked up on it and asked him about it. Prison, she said, changed him.
“That’s a traumatic experience I can’t imagine,” she said.
This story was originally published August 19, 2021 at 5:40 PM.
