A Hillsborough County Sherrif’s Deputy is brought into Tampa General Hospital Saturday afternoon after receiving a gunshot wound. Jason Behnken/The Tampa Tribune

By Mike Wells and Mari Robyn Jones
The Tampa Tribune

Video: Suspect captured | Deputy Shot | Comment

TAMPA - A nearly six-hour search ended Saturday night with the arrest of an 18-year-old who critically wounded a detective during an afternoon undercover drug operation in Progress Village, a Hillsborough County sheriff’s spokesman said.

Detectives were trying to arrest DeAndre Jamal Wallace when he fired a .25-caliber gun at least four times at Detective Christopher Baumann, spokesman J.D. Callaway said. The shooting took place about 3:40 p.m. in front of a house at 5206 82nd St.

Baumann was wounded in the chest and underwent surgery at Tampa General Hospital. He was in critical but stable condition late Saturday, Sheriff David Gee said.

Baumann’s partner fired, possibly twice, at Wallace. Wallace ran, dumping his gun and a magazine in a nearby backyard, Callaway said. Wallace sustained a gunshot wound to the chest. Six hours later, after being found at a McDonald’s, he was taken to a hospital; his condition was unknown, Callaway said.

The sheriff’s office is seeking a second man, who sold undercover detectives crack cocaine shortly before the shooting, Callaway said.

Wallace is expected to be charged with attempted murder on a law enforcement officer and will face other charges, Gee said. Wallace has a juvenile record that dates to January 1999.

Members of several law enforcement agencies joined in the manhunt for Wallace, searching hundreds of houses with high-powered rifles as residents looked on. About 200 officers worked the scene.

After the shooting, the sheriff’s office was in contact with an unidentified person who also was talking to Wallace. About 9:20 p.m., Wallace was found in the parking lot of McDonald’s at 2101 E. 13th Ave., Callaway said.

“It is sad. It’s really sad,” said Bonnie Martin. The gun was found in the backyard of her mother’s house at Ash Avenue and 82nd Street. “That officer was somebody’s son, somebody’s brother. Thank God he didn’t die.”

Baumann has been with the sheriff’s office since 1998. His family, including a young child, was with him at the hospital Saturday, Gee said.

“All of us are praying for him,” said Gee, who visited him at the hospital. “His family is very upset and very worried.”
Neighborhood residents described Wallace as quiet and well-mannered and said he comes from a hardworking family. He lives just blocks from the site of the shooting.

“For him to just shoot a police officer, that’s uncharacteristic,” said Latasha Cooper, 30, who knows his family.
Longtime residents and people who grew up in Progress Village said the neighborhood has changed dramatically and mostly for the worse.

“I’m scared to come home late at night,” said Tammy Sutton, 35, who grew up in the neighborhood. “This used to be more of a family” place.

Children and drug dealers hang out on street corners, residents are being burglarized and cars stolen, Sutton and other residents said.

“It’s an epidemic,” Sutton said. “It’s pitiful out here.”

News Channel 8 reporter Lynn Carson, photojournalist Indira Levine, Tribune reporter Mike Wells and researcher Melanie Coon contributed to this report. Reporter Mari Robyn Jones can be reached at (813) 259-7638 or mjones@tampatrib.com.

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