An East Baton Rouge Sheriff's office unit at a crime scene.
Investigators look over marked evidence in a driveway as Baton Rouge Police investigate the scene of a double shooting on Heidel Avenue Tuesday, September 29, 2020, in Baton Rouge, La. The shooting left two people injured, including a child.
An East Baton Rouge Sheriff's office unit at a crime scene.
After an East Baton Rouge deputy shot a suspect last fall, court filings show, the deputy claimed the man, accused of injuring two people in a 2020 shooting and suspected of violating federal gun laws, had stepped out of his car and leveled a firearm at the cops.
But a lawsuit recently filed against the deputy and Sheriff Sid Gautreaux says the 22-year-old man was actually unarmed and had no way of knowing the people who pulled into his driveway and emerged from an unmarked van, holding firearms and wearing ballistic vests, were plainclothes detectives from the East Baton Rouge Sheriff's Office.
Moments after stepping out of the van's driver seat, deputy Jordan Webb fired his 9 mm Sig Sauer rifle, the complaint says, striking Jaylon Smullen in his right leg and shattering his fibula. Smullen says the encounter in the driveway to his Baker home left him with mental and physical scars and "significant" medical expenses.
Smullen is accused of six counts of attempted first degree murder stemming from a September 2020 shooting that injured two in Baton Rouge's Brookstown neighborhood. When the deputy shot him the following August, records show Smullen was wanted on two warrants: one, on allegations in state court that he violated his $120,000 bond stemming from the attempted murder charges; and two, on a complaint filed by the federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms alleging he took part in conspiracy, lied to a firearms dealer and received a firearm while accused of a felony.
Smullen struck a plea deal with federal prosecutors in July on two weapons-related charges. He could receive a maximum 20-year sentence, but under sentencing guidelines is likely to receive less.
Attorneys representing Smullen in his civil lawsuit, from Baton Rouge-based Maughan Law Firm, did not return a request for comment. His criminal defense attorney in state court, Brent Stockstill, could not be reached.
The sheriff's office said Thursday that Webb was placed on leave after the shooting as part of its standard policy. The shooting was later ruled justified by EBRSO investigators, sheriff's spokesperson Casey Rayborn Hicks said.
Hicks added that the shooting was not ruled life-threatening, in part because deputies rendered medical aid immediately after Webb shot Smullen.
That night in August 2021, while Smullen was out on bond, the ATF had bugged his car on suspicion he was purchasing AR-15 parts through an intermediary at a Denham Springs pawn shop, an agent wrote in an affidavit obtained through federal court records. The EBRSO narcotics detectives followed the young man back to the Baker home where he was staying, a few days before Hurricane Ida struck Louisiana.
When the unmarked gray minivan the deputies were riding in pulled into the carport behind Smullen’s car, the lawsuit says, Webb leapt from the driver’s seat with the rifle in his right hand. According to the lawsuit, Webb said he “saw Smullen get out of the vehicle with a gun in his right hand” and that he was “pointing the gun at sheriff’s deputies.”
Webb claims he told Smullen to drop a gun. The words Webb actually uttered, the lawsuit says, were unintelligible grunts.
“Webb reported that he tried to yell ‘stop, drop the gun,’ but was unable to voice the words,” Smullen’s attorneys wrote in the document. “Instead, he yelled ‘ungh/oohh’ as he discharged his weapon, shooting Smullen in his right leg.”
Audio and video of the shooting confirm that Smullen did not have a weapon in his hands, the lawsuit filed in federal court says. It also shows that Webb neither told Smullen to drop a gun nor identified himself as a law enforcement agent before he opened fire, the lawsuit says. And, the suit claims video shows that Smullen did not make any aggressive motions towards the deputies and was raising his hands in surrender when Webb opened fire.
The Advocate was not able to independently review the video and audio cited in the lawsuit.
After first responders took Smullen to a local hospital to treat him for his leg wound, the ATF agent said in the criminal affidavit, deputies found two handguns inside Smullen’s car and more guns inside the home.
Investigators look over marked evidence in a driveway as Baton Rouge Police investigate the scene of a double shooting on Heidel Avenue Tuesday, September 29, 2020, in Baton Rouge, La. The shooting left two people injured, including a child.
A little under a year before the shooting, Smullen had been the target of a pursuit related to his attempted murder charges which plunged Baton Rouge city police into controversy after officers fired a flash-bang grenade to gain entry to a house where records suggested Smullen had lived. In fact, the young man did not live at the Erie Street home when officers arrived there in October of 2020, though he had rented the dwelling previously, according to news reports.
Lawyers for the family who lived in the house at that time — people of no relation to Smullen — later filed a complaint with BRPD Chief Murphy Paul, claiming the flash-bang shattered windows and damaged a door.
Smullen, then 20, was wanted on the six attempted first-degree murder counts for his alleged role in a Sept. 29, 2020, shooting on Heidel Avenue that left a woman and her young daughter injured. The shooting came amid a surge of gun violence in Louisiana's capital.
Smullen has a procedural court hearing on those state charges on Monday, records show.
Email James Finn at jfinn@theadvocate.com.
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