TAMPA, Fla. _ Prosecutors filed manslaughter charges Monday against the man accused of killing Markeis McGlockton in a shooting that has reignited a debate over Florida's stand your ground law.
According to the Pinellas County Sheriff's Office, Michael Drejka was taken into custody Monday morning. He was being booked Monday afternoon into the Pinellas County Jail, where he will be held in lieu of $100,000 bail.
"It's about time," said McGlockton's father, Michael McGlockton, adding that he was ecstatic. "This is exactly what I wanted. This is exactly what me and my family wanted was to get this guy behind bars."
Pinellas-Pasco State Attorney Bernie McCabe said Monday that his office "reviewed everything, and we filed the charge we think we can prove."
"I'm comfortable that we moved expeditiously to review the case," he said.
Drejka, who turned 48 since the shooting, had avoided arrest since he shot 28-year-old McGlockton on July 19 because of the controversial self-defense law that eliminated one's duty to retreat before resorting to force.
Pinellas Sheriff Bob Gualtieri announced July 20 that his agency was precluded from arresting Drejka because evidence showed it was "within the bookends of stand your ground and within the bookends of force being justified," which provides immunity from arrest, the sheriff said. He forwarded the case Aug. 1 to the Pinellas-Pasco state attorney's office to make a final charging determination.
McCabe declined to elaborate on his decision, citing the pending case, but Drejka's arrest warrant, obtained by the Tampa Bay Times, provides new details.
It follows the same timeline outlined by authorities. The encounter between the two men started when Drejka, of Clearwater, confronted McGlockton's girlfriend, Britany Jacobs, about why she had parked in a handicap-reserved parking space without a decal at the Circle A Food Store on Sunset Point Road.
McGlockton, inside the store with his 5-year-old son, caught wind of the heated argument from witnesses. Surveillance video shows him leaving the store, walking up to Drejka and pushing him to the ground. Drejka then pulls out a gun and shoots McGlockton. He told deputies he was in fear of further attack.
The warrant notes what McGlockton's family and their lawyers have pointed out to show that Drejka's fear wasn't reasonable.
"Drejka steadies the firearm with both hands," it says. "McGlockton immediately backs up when confronted with the firearm. As he backs up to his vehicle he begins to turn towards the front of the store away from the shooter."
It also notes investigators used a scanner that helps capture measurement and distance to find that Drejka was about 12 feet from McGlockton when he fired the shot.
Several questions must be considered in deciding whether someone can be protected under the law when they use force: Was the person acting lawfully? Did the person have a right to be there? And was the person in reasonable fear of serious injury or death?
State legislators revised the law last year to put the onus on prosecutors to disprove a stand your ground claim instead of on defense attorneys to prove one. That would be hashed out at a pretrial immunity hearing.
But first, Drejka would have to file a motion to dismiss the charge under a stand your ground defense. Both McCabe and Gualtieri said they have not heard from any lawyers on behalf of Drejka.
Gualtieri said Monday that he supports McCabe's decision. He reiterated that in order to make an arrest, the facts would have to clearly show stand your ground doesn't apply, which he said wasn't the case here. Otherwise, Drejka would have been in custody while prosecutors considered whether they could meet the burden established under the law.
That differs from a normal arrest in which law enforcement officers "establish if we have the elements of a crime without considering the defenses," said the sheriff, who is also a lawyer.
"This is very unique," he said. "There's no other provision in Florida law that says we have to consider these defenses."
Drejka has remained largely a mystery to the public in the weeks since the shooting. The Tampa Bay Times reported last week that he has been the accused aggressor in four incidents since 2012. He was not arrested in any of the cases and does not have a criminal history in Florida.
His arrest warrant notes three out of four of the prior cases. Two were road rage incidents documented by law enforcement in which he was accused of showing a gun. A third was an argument a few months ago over the same parking space in which Drejka confronted another man, Rick Kelly, and threatened to shoot him. A fourth report found by the Times described an incident in which Drejka braked in front of a woman with two children in her car.
Last month's shooting reignited a national debate around stand your ground _ and race's role in how it's applied. McGlockton was black. Drejka is white.
Benjamin Crump, the civil rights attorney known for representing unarmed black men who died in violent encounters, including Trayvon Martin, signed on to represent Jacobs. Five members of Congress, including Sen. Bill Nelson and Rep. Charlie Crist, called for the Department of Justice Civil Rights Division to open an investigation.
And all the while, rallies and news conferences cropped up nearly every day to call for an arrest, organized by groups such as the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People and Black Lives Matter.
Reaction was swift Monday, with supporters of McGlockton and his family expressing relief and gratitude toward the state attorney's office finding.
"This self-appointed wannabe cop attempted to hide behind stand your ground to defend his indefensible actions, but the truth has finally cut through the noise," Crump said in a statement.
A statement from McGlockton's family said the charge "provides our family with a small measure of comfort in our time of profound mourning."
"While this decision cannot bring back our partner, our son, our father," it continues, "we take solace in knowing our voices are being heard as we work for justice."
The Rev. Al Sharpton, who addressed hundreds during a rally in Clearwater last week, said in a statement the charging decision offers "a ray of hope _ but our work is not done."
Stand your ground laws "are an abomination that systematize a method of vigilante justice that consistently provides cover to racists and bigots for murdering innocent Black Americans," according to the statement.
Marva McWhite, president of the Upper Pinellas/Clearwater branch of the NAACP, expressed a similar sentiment that there is more work to do.
"We're determined to push until we get that legislation off the books," she said, noting that the midterm election is fast approaching.
"The vote is our hope," she said.
Candidates and elected officials from both sides of the aisle have weighed in on the debate over the law and the application in this case, including State Sen. Darryl Rouson who called for a special session to address stand your ground, an effort that failed last week.
On Monday, Rouson, a St. Petersburg Democrat, praised prosecutors for being "thoughtful and deliberate."
He has called for stand your ground reform since McGlockton's death but has received little traction in a Republican-controlled Florida Legislature.
