Man Points Gun At Harford Memorial Security Officer
HAVRE DE GRACE, MD April 8 2021— An Aberdeen man was arrested near Harford Memorial Hospital after police said he threatened a security guard and pointed a gun at him.
Donald Jarvis Jr., 29, of the unit block of Aberdeen Avenue, was charged with illegal possession of a firearm, firearm possession with felony conviction, first-degree assault and reckless endangerment.
The charges stem from an altercation with security that prompted a K-9 search around Harford Memorial Hospital on Friday, April 2. Police said a pellet gun was recovered in the area the next day.
Officers were called at 1:28 p.m. Friday to the hospital in the 500 block of South Union Avenue for a report of a person trespassing who might have had a firearm, according to charging documents.
Jarvis had been asked to leave the hospital property the night before, according to Sgt. Dan Petz, who said a second-degree assault occurred when security asked him to leave. However, Petz said it was up to the security guard to file charges with the court commissioner in the case.
Another security guard had been escorting Jarvis off the property Friday afternoon when Jarvis “tapped his right-side pocket and said, ‘You don’t want me to pull it out,'” according to charging documents. “At that time, [the security officer] stated that Jarvis pulled a chrome-plated semiautomatic pistol from right pocket, racked the slide and pointed it at him.”
Charging documents say the officer told a fellow guard, who heard the slide rack, to “‘take cover.'”
After Jarvis was escorted off the property, officials said he walked down Lodge Lane and turned left onto Alliance Street.
Hospital security staff notified the Havre de Grace Police Department of the incident, and law enforcement found Jarvis in front of the hospital on Union Avenue, charging documents say.
A K-9 specializing in firearms detection and police officers searched the area but failed to find the weapon, according to charging documents.
On Saturday, police found a pellet gun matching the description of the weapon in the area, Petz said in an interview Tuesday night. He said the K-9 did not detect the pellet gun because it could not be tracked like a real gun.
Police said Jarvis “was visibly intoxicated” when he was arrested Friday based on witness and suspect statements, and “Jarvis uttered, ‘You ain’t found the gun yet.'”
The security supervisor at the hospital told police Jarvis yelled out an apology.
When the supervisor asked why, “Jarvis stated he was apologizing for pointing a gun” at the security officer and said “he gave the gun to a friend,” according to charging documents.
Jarvis was taken to the Havre de Grace Police Department for processing and to the Harford County Detention Center for booking. Court records show he is being held without bail at the detention center following a bail review hearing Monday in Harford County District Court.
Police said Jarvis was not allowed to possess a regulated firearm because he had been convicted of armed robbery. Court records show he was sentenced to 20 years in prison with all but five years suspended for armed robbery in 2012. That case was handled by the Aberdeen Police Department.
