The sheriff’s SWAT team responded Wednesday night after learning Officer Jeff Heath, a 19-year veteran of the Panama City Beach Police Department, was intoxicated, distraught and armed. The Sheriff’s Office was the first to arrive on the scene at 8:57 p.m. in the Palm Cove subdivision off
The responding deputy, Corp. Scott Frazier, was previously a
“Mr. Heath was yelling and appeared to be intoxicated,” Frazier’s incident report states. “As I began to speak to him in an attempt to calm him down, he was acting out of control. And as I started to walk towards him, he producted a small-caliber handgun from the waistline of his pants and put the gun to his head.”
Frazier stated in the report that for 8 minutes he tried to no avail to convince Heath to put the gun down, and backup officers began arriving at the scene.
“At this time Mr. Heath went back inside the house and stated, ‘Scotty, they are going to have to bring the fight to me. I’m going to fortify my position,’ “ Frazier states in his report.
Panama City Beach Police Chief Drew Whitman responded to the scene and was able to talk Heath into surrendering after about. Whitman referred comment about the incident to the Sheriff’s Office. The entire incident lasted about two hours.
Sheriff’s Office spokeswoman Ruth Corley said as a safety precaution, the Sheriff’s Office evacuated residents in the neighborhood and set up a perimeter.
“We didn’t know what he was going to do,” she said.
Once Heath was inside his home, he got on the police radio and started making rambling comments and it was clear he was intoxicated, said Sheriff’s Capt. Ricky Ramie.
Ramie said Thursday afternoon that before the chief arrived, Heath fired one shot inside of his house that went into a neighbor’s home, but no one was in the home after the evacuation.
“It could have been very scary,” he said.
Ramie said Heath never pointed the gun at the officers.
“He made it very clear he did not want to hurt anybody,” Ramie said. “There were some tense moments.”
The Sheriff’s Office incident report states Heath’s offense was “reckless display of a firearm,” but no charges had been filed against Heath as of Thursday afternoon.
The 911 dispatch report at the beginning of the incident shows a caller advised that Heath was outside screaming and hollering, and “she is worried about the small children in the house.”
Ramie said Heath’s children were not in the house.
In May 2012, Heath, then a lieutenant, was fired after an internal investigation concluded he was insubordinate and disobeyed orders not to speak about a former female
However, the city’s civil service board ruled Heath could return to the department but demoted him from lieutenant to sergeant and ordered he be suspended for 30 days without pay.
An earlier version of this story is posted below:
The sheriff’s SWAT team responded after learning that officer Jeff Heath, a 19-year veteran of the Panama City Beach Police Department, was distraught and armed.
The sheriff’s office was the first to arrive on the scene at 8:57 p.m. in the Palm Cove subdivision off of
Panama City Beach Police Chief Drew Whitman responded to the scene and was able to talk Heath into surrendering. Whitman referred comment about the incident to the sheriff’s office.
Sheriff’s office spokeswoman Ruth Corley said when sheriff’s officers first encountered Heath, he was in the middle of the street with a gun in the waistline of his pants. Then, he put it in his hand.
“He didn’t point it at anyone,” she said.
Corley said Heath then decided he was going to go in his home and made the comment he was going to “fortify his position.”
She said that warranted the SWAT team being called in.
“We evacutated homes around the neighborhood and set up a perimenter and treated it as if he was going to shoot outwards towards anyone, in case he did,” she said. ‘We didn’t know what he was going to do.”
In March of 2012, Heath, a lieutenant, was placed on administrative leave after a former Panama City Beach Police officer came forward with allegations that he had touched her inappropriately.
In May of that year, he was fired after an internal investigation claimed he was insubordinate and disobeyed orders not to speak about a former female beach officer who accused him of groping her in 2007.
“He was told to stop talking about, dealing with, or contacting a former
The alleged groping happened while Heath and a number of co-workers and friends were bar-hopping on the beach.
A female officer in the group claims Heath forced himself on her, grabbing and putting his hands on her chest and down her pants.
Heath says it didn’t happen.
The female officer, who left the department because of the incident, reported the incident to the Florida Department of Law Enforcement but did not want to file a formal complaint and the accusations were never substantiated.
Former Police Chief Robert Harding had said that he told Heath to stay away from the female officer and not to talk about her anymore, but an internal investigation stated that Heath spoke to other officers about her 147 times over the next four years.
When word got back to her, she filed a formal complaint with the beach police in March of 2012.
Heath’s attorney had argued that no one formally ordered him to be quiet.
In June of 2012, the city’s civil service board ruled that Heath should get his job back after a hearing.
The board ultimately ruled that Heath can return to the department but demoted him from lieutenant to sergeant and ordered he be suspended for 30 days without pay.
Whitman said at the time said that he believed the internal affairs investigation was done properly and he also stood behind the civil service board’s decision.
Check back later today for more information.