According to the man, who asked to remain anonymous, he awoke around 1 am to pounding on his front door; but when he asked who was on the other side, no one responded.
Afraid his home was about to be burglarized, local ABC affiliate WFTV reported, the man retrieved his gun. A bright light shone through the front door when he returned, and someone outside yelled "gun!"
Then the gunfire started.
According to WFTV, "Two bullets flew past the man's head, and more bullets pierced walls and shattered glass windows, he said."
He said he never returned fire, but he, his wife, and their 12-year-old son were forced to huddle on the ground until the gunfire finally stopped.
To add insult to the family's terror at having been pulled from sleep and promptly fired upon, they were then handcuffed by Ocoee Police and seated on the curb outside — and weren't allowed back into their home for 10 hours.
Why were the family members' lives put in jeopardy by this gang-style shootout of their home?
According to WFTV, "he was told police officers mistakenly responded to the home after receiving a report of domestic violence."
Ocoee police Sgt. Bob Rivera said, "Upon arrival, a person was confronted and shots were fired. The investigation is ongoing by the Florida Dept. of Law Enforcement." An FDLE spokesperson concurred, but refused to offer further details.
If police want any sympathy from the public for the supposed difficulties they face on the job, perhaps they should stop making such inexcusable errors — particularly when the consequences have the potential to end people's lives.
One has to ask if the best way to settle a possible domestic dispute is to attempt to shoot the family and then handcuff them and make them sit on the pavement outside their house!!!!
That is clearly going to calm things down and make the victims feel so much better. That there was actually no domestic dispute at that house was clearly a little mistake they can apologise for later. They probably should have checked before trying to kill the people they were supposedly rescuing.
But get used to it, this is the American way from the president down to the janitor, its shoot first ask questions later, sometimes called pre-emptive warfare. Just ask the Iraqi's and Syrians killing a few million people really helps settle things down.