South Carolina man sues sheriff’s office after being shot at nearly 50 times
In South Carolina, a man is taking legal action against a sheriff’s office after alleging that deputies fired nearly 50 shots at him while he was experiencing a mental health crisis in a parked truck, despite raising his hands, with a shotgun on his lap.
According to the lawsuit filed against the York County Sheriff’s Office, Trevor Mullinax miraculously survived being hit nine times in May of 2021, with three of those wounds being to his head.
As captured in police dash cam footage released by Mullinax’s legal team, the four sheriff’s deputies on the scene started firing only a few seconds after arriving, repeatedly yelling “Hands!” before opening fire. The volley of shots lasted for a mere five seconds and resulted in bullet holes littering the pickup’s windshield.
Attorney Justin Bamberg lambasted the sheriff’s deputies’ actions at a news conference on Tuesday, stating, “Those officers went out there like John Wayne cowboys. They came out there like gunslingers.”
Despite the gravity of the situation, prosecutors who reviewed the case decided not to charge the four deputies involved in the shooting. The officers involved claimed that they saw Mullinax reach for a shotgun in the back seat of the truck and point it at them, as outlined in a letter from Solicitor Kevin Brackett, which cleared the officers of wrongdoing.
