UPDATE (7:00 pm) - An officer-involved shooting in Immokalee’s Farm Worker Village Thurday morning left one man dead.
The Collier County Sheriff’s Department says, when deputies responded to a 9-1-1 call, they found a man running down the street with a shovel and a sharp-edged weapon. The deputies told him to stop and put the objects down, but the department says he didn’t comply and one officer shot him.
The man collapsed in a driveway. He has since been identified as 37-year-old Nicholas Morales-Bessannia.
We also spoke with a woman who said Morales-Bessannia was trying to break into her house, so someone called 9-1-1. She didn’t want to give her name, but her story matched what we heard in the 9-1-1 audio.
9-1-1 Audio: Dispatch - “Is he still at the front door?
Caller - "Yes and he keeps yelling for us to open the door."
Dispatch - "Okay, so he’s yelling now?"
Caller - "And he has a shovel and he’s trying now to get open all the, and he’s going to try to break the windows."
“Someone tried to go into my house they were knocking on the door very loudly," said the woman we spoke with. "I’m in shock because I’ve been here for almost 20 years. In 2 years it will be 20 years here living in the village, and I’ve never seen anything like this happen to me.”
We also spoke with another neighbor who lives nearby, who said the man might have been trying to break in because he was injured. Harvey Galvan showed us what he believed to be a trail of blood leading away from the house.
“You can see blood right there, right here, right there," said Galvan.
The trail leads toward a large blood stain in a driveway, where people have now created a makeshift memorial nearby.
We also spoke to a neighbor who shot video with his phone as first-responders did CPR on Morales-Bessannia.
“I was about to call the 9-1-1, and I saw the lights of the police, and I was oh they’re already here. So when I went to check they were already doing CPR," said Miguel
We also spoke briefly with people who said they were the family of Morales Bessannia, and they didn’t want to be interviewed, but they did say that what is in the Sheriff’s Deportment report isn’t totally accurate.
We have put in a request for both body cam and dash cam footage to get a better idea of what happened.
UPDATE (3:30 pm) - The Collier County Sheriff's Office has identified the man who died in the officer-involved shooting as 37-year-old Nicholas Morales-Bessannia of Immokalee.
Investigators say in addition to being armed with a shovel, Morales-Bessannia had a sharp-edge weapon as he ran toward deputies.
CCSO released the 911 audiovia Facebook.
The investigation is continuing.
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Collier County Sheriff's deputies were called to the area of Edenfield Way in Immokalee about a disturbance.
When deputies arrived on the scene, they encountered a subject who was armed with a shovel.
Deputies ordered the subject to the ground, but he did not comply.
The Sheriff's Office says during the encounter, the subject advanced toward the deputies.
Fearing for his safety, the Sheriff's Office says the deputy fired his weapon at the armed subject.
First aid was administered, and the subject was transported to NCH Northeast, where he was pronounced deceased.
A criminal and administrative investigation is being conducted into the shooting.
The deputy who fired the weapon Thursday has been placed on administrative leave.
