KISSIMMEE -- The Osceola County Sheriff is urging people to remain calm as the Florida Department of Law Enforcement investigates the deputy involved shooting that killed a man outside a Target store in Kissimmee last week, and lawyers for his family raise new allegations.
Sheriff Marcos Lopez says in a statement that the state will perform a thorough investigation and he's not going to speculate in the meantime. The sheriff says the deputies were training in a parking lot nearby and didn't have their body cameras on when they came over to investigate a car with shoplifting suspects inside.
Two men were suspected of stealing pizza and Pokemon cards from the store April 27th. A lawyer for the family of the dead man, 20-year-old Jayden Baez, says deputies misused their authority, didn't identify themselves, and treated the men as guinea pigs in their training. "Rather than arresting them, or stopping them, or giving them a notice to appear, they experimented to block them in with their vehicle," said Mark Nejame. He also argued that the allegations would normally be treated as misdemeanors.
Nejame says deputies shot one of the suspects, 19-year-old Joseph Lowe, as he had his hands up.
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