An armed father in Florida shot and killed a neighbor who allegedly followed his son and a friend home and tried to run the man over in a heated roadside confrontation.
Marcus Blicker, 47, was accused of following the gunman’s 16-year-old son and the teen’s boyfriend as the pair drove past his home in Port Orange — a suburb of Daytona Beach — on Oct. 26. according to the Volusia County Sheriff’s Office.
Blicker quickly left his home, began following the children and “erratically” swerved toward the two vehicles they were riding in, police said.
Surveillance footage captured the moment a neighbor allegedly tried to run over an armed father and another person. Fox 35 Orlando
The son called his father to tell him that Blicker was following him.
Blicker chased the teen into the teen’s driveway and threatened the two drivers before the armed father confronted him with a gun around 7:40 p.m., police said.
Blicker followed the gunman’s teenage son onto the lawn and threatened him, police said.
The father fired warning shots into the air and demanded that Blicker leave his property.
“I knew one thing: my son was standing eight feet behind me and that man wasn’t coming near them,” the father, who did not want to be identified, told Fox35 Orlando.
Footage shows Blicker’s truck briefly backed away from the property but then sped toward the father and another person standing nearby, the Volusia County Sheriff’s Office wrote in a statement.
“I had no idea who I was shooting at. I just knew my son was screaming, ‘Daddy, someone is trying to kill me,’” the gunman said.
The father fired a series of warning shots until he shot the truck heading towards him, and another person. Fox 35 Orlando
The father fired several shots at Blicker as the truck drove toward them, but it eventually stopped in the front yard.
Blicker was pronounced dead in the front yard.
A Rottweiler in Blicker’s pickup was injured during the incident, but officials said the dog is expected to recover.
No charges have been filed against the shooter. Fox 35 Orlando
Police did not reveal why Blicker had to follow the teens as they drove past his home.
No criminal charges were filed against the father in the days after the shooting.
Florida is a Stand Your Ground state, meaning self-defense is a form of affirmative defense used to avoid the legal consequences of an otherwise unlawful act of violence in Florida, according to the Jacksonville-based law firm Hussein & Webber.
The company claims that a person in Florida is justified in using deadly force “to prevent imminent death or great bodily harm to himself or another” or when a person resists any attempt to kill such a person or to commit a crime against him or her. or on or in any residential home in which the person is located.”
“He would never have gone there with the intention of making what happened happen or being a part of that,” an unnamed family member told Fox35 Orlando.
The gunman told the local news station that he lost sleep over what happened and wished they could have spoken out against the violence.
“I feel so bad for his family, my family, everyone’s family. Nobody wanted this,” the shooter said.
An investigation is ongoing, but the Volusia County Sheriff’s Office has confirmed that the shooter’s and witnesses’ accounts match what was captured on video and audio recordings.