CLERMONT, Fla. – Clermont officers on Thursday released new details after a police standoff at an apartment complex left a woman and gunman dead.
In a news release, police announced that the incident appeared to be a murder-suicide, identifying the woman as Sarah Dale and the gunman as 28-year-old Christian Steeler Filson. They had recently moved to the apartment complex from Nashville, Tennessee.
“Filson was arrested for aggravated battery and reckless endangerment by discharging a firearm in a 2017 Tennessee incident,” a release from the police department reads. “He has no known criminal involvement in Florida.”
Police said they originally responded to the Cottonwood Apartment complex at 1700 Hooks Street on Wednesday afternoon after receiving a call about a woman “screaming and running from an adult man.”
“When our officers arrived, they immediately observed what appeared to be blood and a spent bullet casing outside of an apartment,” Police Chief Charles Broadway explained. “They began to conduct a well-being check but received no response from the inside.”
Eventually, officers were able to bust into the building through the front door, and once inside, they found Dale dead from an apparent gunshot wound, Broadway added.
Officers at the scene began heading upstairs, finding more blood and evidence of a struggle, the news release shows. But as police searched through one of the interior units, they were soon met with gunfire from Filson.
“We believe this to be an ambush,” Broadway stated. “They returned fire and did a tactical reset.”
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According to investigators, the gunman went back into the apartment when police returned fire. Officers then retreated to a safe position and evacuated nearby apartments.
After officers tried to make contact with the gunman, a SWAT team was finally able to get into the apartment he’d holed up in, where they found him dead with a self-inflicted gunshot wound, police said.
Police later held a news briefing, where they said that Dale and Filson may have been in a romantic relationship. However, no other details were released about what could have prompted the shooting.
Broadway also announced that an officer who fired his weapon during the incident is on administrative leave per protocol.
“This was a truly terrible incident, and our thoughts and prayers go out to the families,” Broadway said.
No additional information has been provided at this time.
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