Deputy shoots erratic driver

The driver is shot in the head after refusing orders to stop, despite being trapped.

[Times photo: Douglas R. Clifford] A Clearwater police officer checks out a van after a shooting at U.S. 19 and Sunset Point Road in Clearwater. The driver, who had refused orders to stop, was shot in the head by a deputy. He was taken to Bayfront Medical Center in St. Petersburg.

By DEBORAH O'NEIL and DEBORAH HIRSCH
© St. Petersburg Times
published May 7, 2002

CLEARWATER -- A Pinellas County sheriff's deputy wounded a motorist in the head Monday night after the man, who was driving erratically, ignored orders to stop and rammed another vehicle.

Michael Seitz of New Port Richey was taken by helicopter to Bayfront Medical Center in St. Petersburg, where he was being treated late Monday night.

Sgt. Greg Tita said deputies received numerous complaints just before 9 p.m. about a man, possibly a drunken driver, driving a 1984 Dodge van erratically on U.S. 19 in Palm Harbor.

Deputies followed the van and tried to stop it at State Road 580 and U.S. 19, but the driver would not pull over, Tita said.

"He ignored all the attempts to do a traffic stop," said Tita, who described the motorist as "a real hazard and menace."

At Sunset Point Road, deputies pulled their cruisers on each side of the van and behind it, trapping the van in traffic, Tita said.

Six deputies got out of their cruisers and surrounded the white van, Tita said. The deputies were shouting commands to Seitz when he rammed a Jeep Wrangler in front of him.

Tita said Seitz rammed the Jeep at least two more times before Deputy Casey Gonzalez fired one shot.

Gonzalez, 31, an eight-year veteran, was standing 5 to 10 feet away when he fired through the driver's side window.

An internal affairs investigation is under way.

Seitz has had troubles in the past. In 2000, Seitz, who had been arguing with his wife rammed his truck into his wife's van, which broke through the wall of the family's living room in Pasco County.

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