Last September,
Diamonds Ford was arrested for shooting a Jacksonville Sheriff SWAT team officer after law enforcement broke a window while serving a search warrant.
The Jacksonville, Florida woman, who was woken the morning of Sept. 28 by the sound of glass breaking, is now asking that charges brought against her be dropped arguing that she was unaware that it was law enforcement attempting to enter her home when she fired gunshots through the window. The bullets hit an officer’s bulletproof vest.
As reported by
Insider, both Ford and her fiance
Anthony Gantt are charged with attempted murder of a police officer and intent to distribute marijuana. The SWAT team was executing a search warrant from the Jacksonville Sheriff’s Office. Ford claims that she was unaware that law enforcement was outside of her home and only fired her weapon because she thought an intruder was entering the house.
Woman claims self-defense after shooting officer during raid
February 9, 2021 GMT
JACKSONVILLE, Fla. (AP) A group of activists and lawyers are calling for Florida authorities to drop charges against a Black woman who said she was acting in self-defense when she shot and wounded an officer during a raid on her home last year.
Diamonds Ford, 28, has said she never heard the SWAT officers identify themselves as law enforcement and thought she was firing at an intruder, as evidenced by the fact that Ford called 911 after firing her weapon.
Ford’s lawyer, Stephen Kelly, said Monday that the 911 call demonstrates that Ford didn’t know police were entering her Jacksonville home.
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“Miss Ford, just hearing her voice, she was in fear,” Kelly said during a news conference outside the Duval County Courthouse. “She thought she was going to die that day.”
Ford and her 28-year-old fiancé, Anthony Gantt, are facing charges of attempted murder of a law enforcement officer and armed possession of marijuana with the intent to distribute, according to court records.
Kelly and other supporters held Monday s news conference to call for those charges to be dropped and to highlight what they said was a case of racial injustice faced by the two Black defendants.
Florida Woman Accused of Shooting Officer Serving Warrant Ammoland Inc. Posted on
U.S.A. –-(AmmoLand.com)- On 28 September 2020, a warrant was served in Jacksonville Florida, just before 8 a.m. The warrant was not a no-knock warrant. There is evidence the officers serving the warrant attempted to announce themselves with loudspeakers and by knocking. The warrant was served by a Special Weapons And Tactics (SWAT) team and the DEA. When they did not get an answer, they started to break in. They were not wearing body cameras.
Diamonds Ford started shooting at them. She hit one officer in his vest, which saved him from a bullet wound. She called 911 and told the operator her home was being attacked.