TAMPA (Miami Herald) — Investigators arriving at a bizarre scene where a car plowed through a house found a 19-year-old driver with a gunshot wound to the chest and a bicyclist dead under the car, Florida authorities said.
The afternoon of May 12, first responders got a report from Mercedes alerting them to a crash involving one of their vehicles, Polk County Sheriff Grady Judd said during a news conference.
First responders found a white Mercedes-AMG fully inside a Lakeland home. None of the residents were there at the time, according to Judd.
Deputies believe 19-year-old Davin Boutwell was shot during a marijuana deal gone wrong, then he passed out while fleeing the scene and ran over 38-year-old Nathaniel Jones before crashing into the home.
At around 1:30 p.m., Boutwell pulled into a neighborhood and was met by a group of young people, and they appeared to have a conversation, Judd said.
Suddenly, the Mercedes took off speeding down the street and hit Jones, who was riding an e-bike to his brother’s home next door to the site of the crash, according to the sheriff.
“He was just so unfortunate to be in the wrong place at the wrong time,” Judd said.
The sheriff said that Boutwell “ran over and pushed our other victim into this home, immediately killing him.”
First responders pulled Boutwell out of the car and realized another person was dead under the vehicle, according to the sheriff, who added that the person who shot Boutwell is responsible for Jones’ death as well.
First responders needed a wrecker to move the car and get Jones out, Judd said.
Investigators found multiple gallon bags of marijuana in the Mercedes, in addition to a stack of cash, according to the sheriff.
“I’m still surprised at the people that will tell you that marijuana is low-level and non-violent,” Judd said. “I’ve got the families of two people this afternoon that will tell you the opposite.”
The sheriff urged those involved in the shooting to turn themselves in.
Lakeland is about a 40-mile drive east from Tampa.
By OLIVIA LLOYD/McClatchy News
Olivia Lloyd is a National Real-Time Reporter for McClatchy covering the Southeast. She is based in South Florida and graduated from Northwestern University’s Medill School of Journalism. Previously, she has worked for Hearst DevHub and the South Florida Sun-Sentinel.
