A Florida deputy fatally shot an 81-year-old woman suffering from a mental health episode after she lunged at him with a knife, authorities said.
Authorities were called to the Rails End Mobile Home Park in Wildwood, about 52 miles northwest of Orlando, just after 11 p.m. Monday “in reference to a female who was in distress and having a mental episode,” the Sumter County Sheriff’s Office said in a news release.
The woman, Janet Sours, had called 911 and said that “people were dying over here” before she hung up, authorities said.
Rescue personnel staged an area outside her home until deputies could secure the area, the sheriff’s office said.
As deputies were investigating whether her complaint “was real or if she was having a mental episode,” Sours pulled a knife from behind her back and lunged at a deputy, “attempting to stab him,” the release alleges.
Authorities said the deputy “took evasive action backing up while simultaneously drawing his service weapon and fired” at Sours, striking her.
Rescue personnel attempted lifesaving measures at the scene, and Sours was taken to the hospital, where she died from her injuries.
Sours’ stepson, John Sours, 66, said he had always remembered her to be “so happy” and “wonderful” to his father, who died in 2018.
“Immediately, when I met her, I just liked her so much. We come to love her,” he said Thursday.
Over the last few months, however, he noticed that “there was a change with Janet” and that she would “ramble” about things that did not make sense, he said.
“I mean, she said some things that didn’t really quite add up,” he said. “But I never ever heard her say anything threatening about anybody or anything like that.”
John Sours questioned why the deputy did not use less lethal means in his interaction with Janet Sours, who he said had knee replacement surgery last month.
“If a police officer is that weak or scared or whatever, he doesn’t need to be in that line of work,” he said. “Police today have other types of weapons at their disposal, such as Tasers, pepper sprays, different non-lethal type of weapons. It seems to me that was way too much force used.”
The sheriff’s office declined to answer questions about the shooting, citing the investigation. A spokesperson said the deputy is on administrative leave pending the outcome of the investigation, a standard procedure.
The Florida Department of Law Enforcement is handling the investigation. It did not immediately respond to a request for comment Thursday.