At a press conference held this afternoon, Friday, April 11, 2025, near Masterpiece Road in Lake Wales, Polk County Sheriff Grady Judd has offered some preliminary details regarding an officer-related shooting in a residential area, resulting in a man’s death.
Judd says that the shooting occurred around 1 PM this afternoon. He stresses that the information provided at this time “is subject to modification as the investigation goes on. This is preliminary information, but as is my policy, we release to the community, and tell them what we’re doing as quickly as we can. Sometimes the information we release has to be modified…so if I say something now, that’s not the final analysis; that’s the first analysis.”
PSCO received a call at around 12:52 this afternoon about a suspicious person that had wandered into a man’s garage. 
“He asked for a gun and said he wanted to be shot and killed,” Judd says. The 78-year-old owner of the home told him to get out of his garage. The suspect it said to have left after some time without injuring the witness, and headed to a neighboring home, stating to a woman at this second property that he wanted to be killed. The suspect ultimately left this property as well, and at least one of the witnesses called 911 to report what had occurred.
At this point, “Our witness has called the Sheriff’s Office, dialed 911, and said ‘we got a guy here that some drugs or something.’” Judd goes on to say that at that time, they were aware that the suspect has committed at least two armed burglaries because he was in possession of a knife.
The first deputy arrives a short time later, and the suspect is described to begin acting in a threatening manner to the deputy.
When the deputy arrives, Judd says, the “suspect starts walking toward her and pulls an knife from his pocket and threatens her and is telling her to kill him; she is trying to de-escalate him. She is backing away and trying to put the patrol car between her and him and telling him to put the knife down.”
The deputy is said to have called for backup while attempting to deescalate the situation.
“Back up arrives just a few seconds later, our backup deputy gets out, and once again tells the guy to put the knife down,” Judd says.
When the back up deputy arrived, the suspect is said to have turned his attention to him, advancing a threat upon him, while being told to stop advancing.
“Our deputy shot multiple times and our suspect fell in the middle of Masterpiece Road,” Judd says. “EMS and Fire obviously were immediately notified to respond. We started life-saving measures, but his life could not be saved.
“There’s an investigation underway by the 10th Judicial Circuit Officer-Involved Task Force, and that information will be ultimately sent to our state attorney Brian Haas, but I can tell you this – this man is dangerous. He presented himself as dangerous And he asked to be shot. He demanded to be shot and then he forced us to shoot him, so we obliged. He asked for it, and he got it.
“Our deputies were in a position of grave danger and risk, and they protected themselves,” says Judd.
The deputy that arrived as back up, was identified as the deputy who shot the suspect. Only one deputy is said to have fired upon the suspect, according to Judd.
The preliminary investigation also uncovered that the suspect had allegedly committed a third home invasion the night before, but that incident was not initially reported to law-enforcement.
The suspect, whose name will not be released until next of kin, notification has been made, is said to be a heavyset, white male, approximately 43 years old, from the Gainesville area. He is said to have been in the area for approximately two weeks. The suspect is said to have a criminal history indicating multiple arrests involving methamphetamines.
“This is the early stages of the investigation,’ Judd says. “We have to sort all that out…for whatever reason last night he began a spree of breaking into three homes while the people were there and at least two of them told us that he demanded to be killed.”
It is unknown at this time how many shots were fired. Forensics will confirm that information at a later time.
“Our forensic team is working on that and we will be able to release that,” says Judd. “I can tell you, it’s multiple times, and he was shot enough to stop the threat, which is exactly what our deputy should’ve done.”
