Man says stray bullet from deadly deputy shooting pierced his garage door, car

LAKE COUNTY, Fla. — A Eustis man believes a stray bullet from a deputy-involved shooting ended up in his house. Now the Lake County Sheriff’s Office says they’re investigating.

Miguel Muniz lives down the street from where Lake County deputies shot and killed Tracy Richards on Thursday morning.

“When I got up, I walk around, I see a hole in the garage,” Muniz said. “So I said, ‘That doesn’t look right. That wasn’t there yesterday.’”

When he raised the garage door, Muniz says he quickly realized the hole wasn’t just vandalism. He saw an even larger hole in his car.

“It’s gotta be a bullet from somewhere,” he remembers thinking.

Muniz says he went around the car, lowered the back seat and realized there was also a hole in the metal bar at the back of the trunk and in the back seat.

“That’s where my daughter always sits down right there in the morning when we leave the house, so I was like, ‘Oh my God,'” Muniz said.

Later that morning, he saw the news. Deputies had shot and killed Tracy Richards right across the street. Muniz figured the two scenes must be connected and called police, still concerned about how close a call the bullet could've been.

The report Channel 9 obtained from police shows the responding officer wrote that he believed “that a single round did enter the garage door” and that Muniz’s house “is in line with where the shooting occurred that morning."

“You’re not safe in your own home,” Muniz said. “I don’t know what to say. I was, like, ‘This is crazy.’ I didn’t know what to think.”

Muniz says the responding Eustis police officer handed him a card with a case number on it and left.

A day later, Muniz hadn’t heard from police, so he rang them. He says he was told to call the sheriff’s office because the shooting involved their deputies. But when he reached LCSO he says they told him he had to talk with police.

Muniz said he didn’t understand what was taking so long and why no one had called just to indicate they’re working to investigate the issue.

“They checked to make sure all the bullets were accounted for,” Muniz said, remembering his conversation with the officer. There was one missing and I say, ‘Well, it's gotta be that.’"

A spokesperson for LCSO tells me that Monday morning the report and evidence was sent to their attorney.

The attorney is reviewing it and will send it to their insurance company to repair damage if they are responsible.

Cox Media Group