FORT LAUDERDALE, FLA. (WSVN) - All bullets that struck a UPS driver who was killed after jewelry store robbers hijacked his truck and exchanged gunfire with authorities came from police officers, a newly released report states.
7News on Wednesday obtained the Florida Department of Law Enforcement report about the fatal shooting of Frank Ordonez after armed men hijacked the truck and ended in a shootout with police.
The 66-page document describes gunfire and chaos on a jam-packed Miramar intersection on Dec. 5, 2019.
7Skyforce followed the scene from above as police tried to stop the fleeing truck, which carried the two jewelry store thieves and Ordonez after the suspects took the UPS driver hostage.
For over an hour, multiple police agencies engaged in the pursuit of the truck.
The report said FDLE investigators scoured through red-light cameras, surveillance and cellphone videos, 54 police body-worn cameras and interviewed dozens of witnesses as they pieced together the events that unfolded that day.
Investigators said that at 5:23 p.m, dispatchers told police, “Attention all units, do not approach the vehicle. Again, attention all units, do not approach the vehicle. The subject has shot at units multiple times.”
But 12 minutes later, on Miramar Parkway and Flamingo Road, there was this radio communication: “He is boxed in now. He is boxed in with all the traffic. Definitely no way out now, not for him there. Have Pines and Miramar (Police) not let any traffic through the intersection on Flamingo. Any units here, go to the intersection and stop all the traffic there. Shots fired, shots fired, shots fired. Crossfire, crossfire, crossfire. Seek cover, seek cover.”
According to the report, one witness was “…very sure that the first shots came from the subject inside the UPS truck.”
But then mayhem ensued.
According to the report, officers fired nearly 200 rounds, some of which hit Ordonez, the innocent driver.
Witnesses described the mayhem to police.
One said the bullets hit “his daughter’s car seat,” another said the bullets landed on the driver’s side headrest, and a third witness told officers “there were bullets everywhere.”
The report said, of the rounds fired, Ordonez was hit by bullets from all four police officers that were indicted.
Both suspects, Ordonez and another driver, Richard Cutshaw, would all die from bullet wounds. Ordonez was just 27 years old.
Four Miami-Dade Police officers — Jose Mateo, Leslie Lee, Richard Santiesteban and Rodolfo Mirabal — were indicted as a result of the shootout. They all face manslaughter charges.
The pain is still unbearable for Ordonez’s family.
“I just think it’s so unfair. You guys came home to your families; we came home to nothing,” said Ordonez’s sister, Geneviève Merino. “They could’ve waited, like this could’ve been avoided.”
The family said they already suspected the findings of the report.
“I just can’t imagine in my head how he was feeling. My brother had kids, so I just I can’t imagine the moment that he was literally in front of death,” said Merino.
“They should’ve held back. Obviously, the report says it all,” said Joe Merino, the victim’s stepfather. “Those memories just don’t go away. It’s the same movie. You can play it back over and over again, and it’s the same movie. The same, it’s the same outcome.”
The four officers have all pleaded not guilty and are out on bail.
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