good afternoon everybody anybody not ready yeah all right I'm a Pinellas County Sheriff Bob wall Tyrian with me is Chief Anthony Holloway from the st. Petersburg Police Department and I think as everybody knows to address the significant number of auto thefts and related crime the st. Petersburg police department in the Pinellas County Sheriff's Office have formed an auto theft task force the task force was working early this morning in st. Petersburg and at approximately 3 10 a.m. a st. Petersburg officer observed a 1998 Ford Windstar van driving recklessly at the intersection of 22nd Avenue South and 16th Street the vehicle was traveling the high rate of speed and at one point even went up on two wheels as it was traveling down the street the tag on that van showed the name of the registered owner but did not provide any vehicle information which is highly unusual and it can mean a number of different things but the officers and deputies weren't able to determine if that tag belonged on that vehicle and the vehicle matched the description of a stolen vehicle that the task force had been alerted to and was looking for in the area the officer lost sight of the vehicle it was found a few minutes later that the Obama Food Mart located at 1418 Avenue South officers decided not to try and stop the car at the Food Mart and due to heavy foot traffic in the area shortly after that the car left the area and went to 1414 20th Avenue south which would be just south of where the Obama Food Mart is located where it parked on the south side of the street facing the wrong way the driver was observed talking with someone who was standing on the side of the road on the south side of the street at that point a st. Petersburg police officer in a marked patrol car attempted to conduct a traffic stop the officer activated his emergency equipment and immediately upon seeing the cruisers emergency lights the driver of the car who's now been identified as Cory Leon Williams accelerated in Reverse and rammed an unmarked police car that was behind the Winstar man there was a passenger in the car in the Winstar van who's now been identified as Alton Fitzgerald Whichard in that unmarked car there were two officers and an officer who was a passenger in the mr car received minor injuries when his head hit the side pillar due to the impact after striking the unmarked police car Williams accelerated forward driving off the roadway he was already on the south side of the road he went up onto the side walking into kind of a dirt lot that's on the south side of the road and that went back onto the roadway and struck the front end of the marked police car before accelerating in fleeing West on 20th 20th Avenue south the Pinellas County Sheriff's Office helicopter was overhead and followed the cars that traveled westbound fleeing from police officers and sheriff's deputies a Sheriff's Office unmarked car driven by corporal Jonathan clearing observed the car on 22nd Avenue South just east of 22nd Street and another sheriff's unmarked car driven by deputy Ariel Mata was behind corporal Cleary Williams then turned north on 22nd Street and immediately west in an alley just south of 21st Avenue south the car slowed upon entering the alley and Whichard who is a passenger in the car immediately exited the vehicle and was observed carry in an ar-15 assault rifle Williams the driver continued to flee westbound in the vehicle and he was followed by corporal Cleary and deputy Mota pursued Whichard is Richard ran north on the east side of the residence located at 22 20 21st Avenue South Deputy Megan Nestor was also in the car with deputy Matta deputy Matta who was yelling at which her to drop the gun and repeated that command several times as Whichard was running north along the east side of the residence as they rounded the north side of the house deputy Mata again yelled for Whichard to drop the gun at which time Whichard turned with the rifle toward deputy Mata deputy Mata feared that he was going to be shot and he fired his handgun approximately five times striking Whichard twice and in his torso and also there was one round it grazed his hand richard fell to the ground on top of the assault rifle deputies and officers secured the rifle immediately rendered cpr and other medical aid the st. Petersburg Fire Rescue responded and transported Whicher to Bayfront Medical Center where he was pronounced dead Richards next to Ken had been notified Williams who was the driver of the vehicle that fled was stopped and arrested near his house at 22:47 23rd Avenue South Williams is in custody and he's been charged with aggravated battery felony fleeing and eluding and driving with a suspended or revoked driver's license Richard was 37 years old and has an extensive criminal history with 18 prior arrests on 33 different charges baby dating back to 1996 Richard's prior arrests include being a felon in possession of a firearm carrying a concealed firearm cocaine possession fleeing and eluding resisting an officer aggravated battery escape failure to appear in violation of probation at the time he was shot by deputy Mata Whichard had four thousand dollars in cash as well as marijuana in his pockets the vehicle hasn't been impounded and we're waiting search warrant we don't know whether there are any other drugs or contraband in the car Williams is 31 years old he also has a criminal history haven't been arrested in Florida for disorderly intoxication in food up here for driving with a suspended license and in Virginia for possession of a firearm while possessing illegal drugs drug conspiracy possession of a firearm by a convicted felon in assault and battery the ar-15 rifle was voted with 17 223 caliber rounds and the switch on the ar-15 was in the fire position this is an extremely powerful weapon that would have pierced the body armor by the deputies we're conducting a conducting a trace on the gun and as of now we do not know whether it is stolen or how Richard obtained the gun deputy Mata has been with the Pinellas County Sheriff's Office for four years he has no prior shootings and he'll be placed on administrative leave with pay until cleared to return to duty the investigation the shooting investigation is being conducted according to normal protocol by the Pinellas County Sheriff's Office Robbery Homicide Unit and the pinellas pasco State Attorney's Office is conducting its own independent investigation as you can see here from the photographs of Whichard and the firearm that he was carrying this is the actual ar-15 assault rifle as laid on the ground on the grass he fell on top of it after he was shot these are the two to three rounds that came out of the magazine of the gun and you can see over here that this is the area that where this started and the officer first saw the car here at 16th and 22nd the car then went up to the area where the Obama Foodmart is here number two on this on this map number three down here is where the ramming occurred and then of course the incident where the shooting occurred was over here on 21st Avenue South number four so as all in this area of South st. Petersburg and when the car after ramming the st. Petersburg police cars it fled and it was kind of a zig-zag pattern all the way to get over here to that to that alley and this is the east side of the house that I was talking to you about where south of this is the alley and as Richard ran north he came around here and deputy mata was rounded here in his vehicle deputy Motta's vehicle stopped here and Richard was here when he turned the assault rifle to him so the actual shooting occurred right here on the corner of this house so with that I'll turn it over to chief Holloway for anything he wants to add and then we're happy to take any questions that you all may have okay good afternoon everyone just to let you know st. pubert police department and Sheriff's Office has been working on the auto-theft task force to reduce the auto staff that have been occurring not only just in st. Pete but throughout the Tampa Bay area and we will continue to work with each other and that's what we have to say thank you anybody have any questions right you know it and what we have said is you know tip that this is a problem that has been prolific if you will epidemic it is prime mark primarily involved young people but not solely and it just goes to show that it is widespread Whichard is 37 years old and but you know it isn't limited to any one group or any one area or any one demographic it is a widespread problem and just just goes to show the breadth of it everywhere and the ball is a bunch of different people so no it isn't what we saw a few weeks ago but this is consistent with you know what we are seeing with the overall problem throughout the entire county so we are seeing some of this but it isn't you know the juveniles in this particular case no I don't think there's any question the task force is making a difference I think the partnership between st. Petersburg Police Department the Sheriff's Office is very effective and is making a difference in deterring these people from engaging in this activity and apprehending those who are engaged in it and the task force is very active and there are several times a night where they're engaging in enforcement activity and recovering stolen cars and we're going to continue it and address this type of activity throughout Pinellas County and hopefully eliminate it the best we can well you know and as I said before and I think that it's a sad situation where people don't respect law enforcement and I think we're seeing that and they don't have any regard for safety of anybody including police officers and it's a disrespect issue it's a lack of respect it's a lack of fear of consequences let me look at this guys arrested you know on you know 18 different times on 30-something charges he's been in the criminal justice system before he's not new to it and he didn't think twice about ramming not just one but hitting a second police car running from the police they're driving out there recklessly up on two wheels and then when they go down an alley and they're running from the police is that he turns this very very powerful assault rifle with 17 rounds in two to three rounds that are lethal rounds and didn't think twice about turning that on a police officer so again people like this who are criminals don't have any regard for safety or for the police now and again Williams didn't have anything on him but we have not been able to search the car yet he will not give us consent so we're gonna have to obtain a search warrant so we don't know what may or may not additionally be in that car so that's all still part of this as always is the case and we're trying to give you as much information as we know it as quickly as we can but it's all still fluid it is still all under investigation and there are still in fact interviews occurring as we speak in investigative leads that are being followed up that's certainly something that we'll do and if we find anything of significance we'll let you know so what we know right now is he had four thousand in cash and a little bit of drugs on his person I would hope by the end of the day today or sometime tonight I would hope at the latest it should be tomorrow but we're working on it well with those kind of rounds everybody's at risk you know you it would penetrate cars they'll penetrate volker vests you know a body resistant armor that would go through homes that go through just about anything it's a very powerful weapon and a dangerous weapon when it's in the hands of somebody who is a criminal who has no work no regard for anybody's safety and no regard for the police so this this could have been a very very bad day in a very bad situation no question about it it was very thankful that nobody and including no law enforcement officers were hurt or killed as a result of which ERDs action actions now because this one the best we can tell with this and we won't know until it's dismantled is semi-automatic it's not fully automatic and so you know they're out there you know in the reality of it is is this guy's a convicted felon he can't possess firearms anyway it doesn't matter to him and I you know and well I can't tell you definitively because I don't we don't know we weren't gonna trace it back and see what we can find out is is that I'm confident as stolen and was taken in some burglary or some theft somewhere and that's what we're going to trace it back to so you know these are not the kind of people that abide by any laws or any gun laws and they you know steal the guns and then use them for criminal activity and that's what happens all right anybody have anything else you wanna yes okay all right thanks yeah it's a y AR ie L oreal mata Mata pard me y AR IE al Uriel mata Mata alright thank you everybody appreciated