An 18-year-old man was shot in the arm in the vicinity of the Flagler Beach Fire Department and taken to the hospital with the non-life-threatening injury this evening, Flagler Beach Police Chief Matt Doughney said. The alleged assailant fled the city and is unknown and at large for now.
“We’re still trying to figure out putting the pieces together,” Doughney said. “There were a lot of kids around here, we’re trying to figure out” what happened. The suspect “is no longer here,” but “it doesn’t appear that there’s any safety concerns for anybody in Flagler Beach,” the chief said.
But Doughney noted: “We don’t believe he’s a danger in our city, don’t know who he is but we believe he’s taken flight out of the city, but yeah, whoever that person is, he does pose a danger, he shot somebody in our city.”
The Flagler Beach Police Department and the Flagler County Sheriff’s Office are jointly investigating the shooting. The number of young people at the scene of the shooting suggests investigators may have witnesses. It is also likely that, between the city’s own license plate readers and those of the Sheriff’s Office, in place at the bridge and at other key points in and out of the city, authorities will at least have some indications about people who left the area of the shooting by car. Doughney said video is being analyzed.
The sheriff’s Major Case Unit and its Crime Scene Investigations unit have responded, as has the city’s detective Rosanna Vinci and others.
The shooting took place at 6:38 p.m. on South Flagler Avenue. The avenue from the city’s Fire Department to South 7th Street is closed to traffic.
Doughney said he was confident that between his department and the Sheriff’s Office, “we’ll figure it out and find the person resp. This doesn’t happen very often in Flagler Beach. We do everything we can to make sure it doesn’t, and when it does, we will not rest until we figure out who did this.”
The last shooting in the city took place late last November when a person with mental issues went on a shooing spree within his room at the Topaz Motel. No one was hurt. The man faces four felonies. His case is still wending its way through Circuit Court.
