Man charged with shooting 2 Frederick police officers sentenced to secure mental health facility
Bodycam footage shows confrontation between Frederick County officers, suspect
The Frederick County Police Department has released bodycam footage from a February 2022 incident where a suspect shot two officers at the intersection of Waverley Dr. and Key Parkway. A judge ruled Monday that the man charged with the attempted second-degree murder of two Frederick officers will not go to prison. FOX 5's Lili Zheng has the story.
FREDERICK, Md. - A man charged with injuring two Frederick police officers in a shooting will not go to prison after he was found guilty in the shooting — but not criminally responsible.
Dominque Lamarr Lewis, now 27, shot two officers in February 2022. He has been committed to the Maryland Department of Health for the shooting, according to an order signed by Judge Julie Solt. The facility will be the Clifton T. Perkins Hospital Center, according to Frederick County State’s Attorney Charlie Smith.
"These are jails. They still have barbed wire. They’re not walking around outside. They’re incarcerated. It just so happens to be a jail with enhanced medical facilities where they give medication and they do therapy, so he’s not walking around in public," Smith said Monday. "This is a jail. It’s just medical prison, really, is what it is."
Frederick Police Chief Jason Lando released a statement saying he could not conceal his disappointment with this order from the judge, adding that it was difficult to see his officers attacked last year and that this verdict was difficult too.
"It was extremely difficult to see my officers attacked, to watch them fight for their lives, and then witness their hard work as they tried to fully recover over the past two years. Today, it was nearly just as difficult watching the person who attacked my officers found not criminally responsible for his actions," Police Chief Jason Lando wrote.
The police department released body camera video from that shooting Monday.
The footage from officers Bryan Snyder and Kristen Kowalsky shows them arriving at the intersection of Waverly Drive and Key Parkway in Frederick around 12:45 p.m. on Friday, Feb. 11 after receiving a report about a suspicious man possibly in possession of a firearm.
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When the officers first approached Lewis, he was lying on a green transformer box.
Officer Snyder heard on video talking to Lewis, "Hey, what’s going on? Mind stepping down for me?" before gunfire erupts. Both Snyder and Kowalsky indicated they had been shot before a third officer arrived to assist. Lewis was also shot in the hip area.
All three were flown to a hospital in Baltimore for treatment.
Evaluations throughout the nearly two-year case found that Lewis was competent to stand trial.
Online court records show that he was also scheduled for one in April but the Department of Health reported that he did not understand the criminality of his actions.
"If you take a look at that report, he believed that God was going to test him that day and God was going to send someone to approach him in this manner. He felt like he was justified in his response. Hard for us to believe that, but the people at the Department of Health did believe it," he said.
The State’s Attorney for Frederick County says Lewis will remain committed to the Department of Health which he described as a "medical prison" of sorts.
"Obviously, we want him held responsible for what he did to these two police officers and we want him removed from the public forever and I think that will occur. I understand that the police chief was upset but at the end of the day, I was upset too," Smith said. "But I’m not a medical provider, I’m a lawyer and the medical people at the Department of Health said he had something going on at the time, that he didn’t understand what was going on."
This was not Lewis’ first brush with the medical and legal system, Smith said. Originally from Hampton, Virginia, Lewis had been diagnosed with schizophrenia on two occasions and was committed at one point with family, Smith said.
Lewis was being represented by a public defender. FOX 5 reached out for comment and received a response from John Maclean, who confirmed the order.
"Any comments I made you can get by getting an audio of the hearing," Maclean wrote in an email.
The State’s Attorney says Lewis will remain committed unless he’s deemed to no longer be a threat to the public. However, he says he doubts that will happen.