VERO BEACH — A deputy who responded to a suicidal call shot a woman after she lunged at him with a large butcher knife, Indian River County Sheriff Deryl Loar said in a news conference Thursday.
The deputy-involved shooting happened about 8 p.m. Wednesday at a home in the 600 block of Carriage Way, Vero Beach. The woman, Susan Teel, 62, was pronounced dead at the scene, sheriff’s spokesman Eric Flowers said.
Front view of the Carriage Lake subdivision, where a woman inside one of the homes was shot by a deputy Wednesday July 26, 2017, in Vero Beach.
PHOTO CONTRIBUTED BY WRITER NICK SAMUEL
“It was a split-second decision,” Loar said. “It’s an unfortunate incident. The deputy did what he was trained to do.”
The deputy, whose name will be released later today, has worked for the Sheriff’s Office for five years, Loar said.
Shortly before 8 p.m. Wednesday, Loar said Susan Teel’s husband, Dr. Dudley Teel, found her in the bathtub cutting her wrists with a razor knife. Dudley Teel is an emergency medicine doctor and is affiliated with Sebastian River Medical Center, according to Health.usnews.com.
Loar said the Sheriff’s Office believes Dudley Teel told their daughter, who was not at the home, to call 911. Her age was not immediately available.
In the 911 call, which was released Thursday, the daughter told a dispatcher “My mom just tried to kill herself.” She also said that her mother might’ve intoxicated,
A deputy arrived at the scene within three minutes and spoke to Dudley Teel, who told them Susan Teel was upstairs trying to harm herself, Loar said. When the deputy ran upstairs to the master bedroom, the woman tried to cut him with the butcher knife.
“He ran upstairs with the intention of saving her life,” Loar said. “When the deputy entered the bedroom, she became combative.”
A taser was not used and it’s unknown if the deputy had time to warn her to drop the knife, Loar said. When asked about the possibility of shooting the woman in the leg, Loar said “we’re not trained to shoot the leg.”
The number of times the woman was shot was not immediately available.
Dudley and Susan Teel were the only ones home at the time of the shooting, Loar said. Information on who all lives at the home was not immediately available.
Loar said Dudley Teel was in distraught after the shooting. He said deputies have been called to the home 24 times within the past several years, with some involving Susan Teel and others involving more family members.
Anytime there’s a law enforcement involved fatality, a grand jury will occur, Loar said. A date on when the shooting will go to a grand jury was not immediately available.
The deputy was placed on administrative leave, which is a standard practice for deadly force incidents.
“This has been a trying time for the Sheriff’s Office for the last five months,” Loar said.