Police said a 53-year-old man crashed into a home, ignored commands and reached for a gun before an officer opened fire.
FRUITLAND PARK, Fla. — A man police said was carrying a hatchet was shot and killed early Wednesday after officers responding to a crash found him walking away from a damaged home in Fruitland Park and saw him reach for a firearm during the encounter.
The shooting followed a pickup truck crash on East Mirror Lake Drive and quickly drew state investigators to the neighborhood. Fruitland Park police identified the man as 53-year-old Duane Terrell Holston. Interim Police Chief Henry Rains said the Florida Department of Law Enforcement is handling the inquiry, while local officials are treating the case as a major event in a city where he said a fatal officer-involved shooting had not happened before.
Police said the chain of events began around 2:30 a.m. Wednesday, when officers were sent to a home after reports that a truck had slammed into the property. Video provided by the homeowner showed the pickup pushed into a column near the garage, leaving visible damage to the front of the residence. Officers arriving at the scene found a man walking away from the wreckage with what they described as a hatchet in one hand. Rains said the first officer gave verbal commands for the man to stop, but he kept moving and said, “I just want to go home.” Within about a minute, according to the chief’s account, a second officer arrived. Rains said the situation then tightened in a matter of seconds, ending when police say Holston reached for a gun and an officer fired.
Authorities said Holston was struck by gunfire during that confrontation. Accounts released by local media and police statements agree that officers recovered a firearm at the scene. One report said officers rendered medical aid after the shooting, but Holston died from his injuries. Police have not publicly said how many shots were fired, how many officers discharged their weapons or exactly how far Holston was from the officers when the gunfire began. They also have not said why the pickup crashed into the home in the first place or whether Holston knew anyone at the address. No officers were injured. The homeowner did not speak on camera, but shared crash video with local television reporters, showing the force of the impact that brought officers to the block before sunrise.
By Wednesday afternoon, the shooting had become the central topic in this small Lake County city, where neighbors said the scene felt highly unusual. David Klemann, who lives nearby, told reporters he was awake when he heard what sounded like four sharp knocks around 2:30 a.m. and later realized they were gunshots. The chief said the city, now more than 100 years old, had not previously recorded a fatal officer-involved shooting to his knowledge. That detail added to the weight of the response, with police lights stretching across the neighborhood and investigators working only a short distance from City Hall and the police department. Holston’s name also brought renewed attention to his criminal history in Lake County and other Central Florida jurisdictions, which local reports described as lengthy, though that history does not answer the central question investigators now face: whether the officers’ use of deadly force was legally justified under the circumstances they encountered on Mirror Lake Drive.
That determination will now rest with outside investigators and prosecutors. FDLE is conducting the independent investigation that commonly follows police shootings in Florida, and Fruitland Park police said they are cooperating with both the state agency and the state attorney’s office. Rains said the department plans to wait until the FDLE investigation is complete before releasing body-camera video. That means some of the most important details in the case, including the officers’ exact positions, the timing of commands and the suspect’s precise movements before the shots, may remain unanswered for some time. Officials also have not announced whether dispatch recordings, incident reports or video from nearby homes will be released before the state inquiry is finished.
The neighborhood showed signs of both the crash and the shooting Wednesday, with damage still visible at the home and residents trying to make sense of an event they said felt out of place in the area. The pickup’s impact had rattled the house, the homeowner said through the video she provided, and the later burst of gunfire turned a crash call into a death investigation. Rains, speaking publicly about the case, said the time between the first officer’s arrival and the shooting was brief. That compressed timeline is likely to become a major focus as investigators review body-camera footage, physical evidence and officer statements. For now, the city is left with a narrow block, a damaged home and a shooting case that moved from traffic crash to fatal confrontation in a matter of minutes.
The case remained under state investigation Wednesday evening, with police withholding body-camera footage until that review is complete and no public date yet announced for the next formal update.
Author note: Last updated March 25, 2026.