In the third police shooting in just over a week in Jacksonville, two officers shot a man who, according to the Sheriff’s Office, unprovoked stabbed a road construction worker, led them on a police chase and tried to attack a sergeant.
It all started around 10:45 p.m. Tuesday when a man driving through a road construction site at Interstate 295 and Main Street got out of his vehicle and “for whatever reason” stabbed a worker who was helping direct drivers through traffic, Chief Alan Parker. said. The crew member ran to a foreman who found a sheriff’s officer, Sgt. Ralaska Hoover, who worked there off-duty.
The suspect had gotten back into his car, so she got into hers and activated her lights and sirens in pursuit. Another officer, Sgt. Torrie Robinson, in the area, participated in the short chase that ended in the 400 block of Duval Station Road when the suspect stopped and got out of his car, Parker said.
“They ordered him, ‘Get down on the ground, let’s see your hands,’” Parker said. “He approached with a knife and then began attacking Sergeant Hoover. She attempted to taser him with her issued Taser, it was ineffective, and then he actually picked up his pace and ran towards her with his knife in his hand to attack to attack Sgt. Robinson engaged him, shot him several times, and Sergeant Hoover switched her Taser, she shot him too.
“From the moment he got out of the car, it took about 12 seconds for the whole thing to be over,” Parker said.
He received medical treatment and was in critical condition. He has been identified as 39-year-old Benjamin Mpolesha Kubi. Parker said he did something similar in October and threatened an officer.
“Like a month ago, he stopped by one of our officers who was dealing with a traffic accident,” the chief said. “He pulled over and did the finger thing [pointing like a gun] and basically he said, ‘You’re a dead man.’ The officer said, what did you say to me, and he repeated himself and eventually he drove away.”
The officer was able to obtain his license plate number and file an information report, but there had been no further contact with him, Parker said.
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Parker said the construction worker is expected to be OK. He said they have no idea of a motive: “It seems random.”
It was the first shooting for both officers, the chief said. Hoover has been with the Sheriff’s Office for 16 years and Robinson for 15 years.
What were the other recent police shootings in Jacksonville?
In the previous police shooting on Friday, an officer shot a military veteran’s PTSD-induced dog that had bitten him, and a fragment of the gunshot struck the 33-year-old owner’s shin, the Sheriff’s Office said. The dog was expected to live.
The officer was called to an armed dispute between two women in the area of College Street and Willow Branch Avenue. A homeless woman had accused the veteran, who was with her dog and 4-year-old daughter, of stealing her bicycle and they got into a heated argument, according to the incident report. The veteran said she had a gun and police were called. When the officer spoke to her, the dog attacked him.
In a Nov. 11 shooting, a parent posed as her 13-year-old daughter when an 18-year-old inappropriately texted her and arranged to meet at a Mcduff Avenue Popeyes restaurant. When the mother arrived with her daughter and son, the older teen threatened them with a gun, the Sheriff’s Office previously said. An arriving officer located him behind the restaurant and shot him when the sheriff’s office said the 18-year-old pulled the gun on him. Cerry Rodriques Banks III was treated at a hospital and taken to jail, where he is ordered to post $700,000 bail on multiple charges.
The latest shooting marks the eighth suspect shot by Jacksonville police this year, three of which were fatal. The Sheriff’s Office is not counting the woman at this time because it may have been a piece of concrete or something else when the bullet hit the ground.
Thirteen suspects were shot last year, nine of them fatally, according to Times-Union data.
This article originally appeared in the Florida Times-Union: Random stabbing of highway worker leads to police shooting in Jacksonville
