Off duty police officer working security arrested for shooting Walmart shoplifter
Oklahoma County OK July 26 2020
A Walmart security guard has been charged with assault and battery with a deadly weapon for shooting a fleeing shoplifting suspect on the Fourth of July.
Jimmie Odell Watts Jr. was charged Friday with the felony in Oklahoma County District Court.
He is accused of going too far when he fired multiple times in the parking lot of a Walmart in Del City.
At the time, Watts, 37, of Oklahoma City, was an off-duty police officer at Langston University. He was put on administrative leave after the shooting, his attorney said.
“He’s a good guy,” the attorney, Gary James, said. “The guy’s got two college degrees … and been in law enforcement for 13 years. … He was put in a predicament.”
The charge comes at a time of intense public scrutiny on the actions of law enforcement in the wake of the death of a Black man in May in police custody in Minneapolis. District Attorney David Prater made the decision himself on charging Watts.
He shot Kenneth Lee Simmons, 28, of Oklahoma City, Del City multiple times police said.
Videos of the confrontation show the off-duty police officer working as a security guard struggling with the suspect at the door of a Nissan Sentra. He then pulled his gun after the driver backed out of a parking space with the door open. At least 10 shots were fired.
Watts told Del City police the door hit him as the suspect backed up and he moved to keep from being struck further.
Police reported the guard began firing when the suspect stopped backing up and began moving forward. Police reported the officer continued firing as the suspect drove away.
“Watts was not in danger of great bodily injury or death when he fired rounds into the back of the vehicle,” a Del City police officer wrote in a court affidavit. “There was no reasonable belief that Simmons posed a significant threat of death or serious physical injury to Watts or any other person at the point Watts continued to shoot.”
The officer’s attorney said he probably would have been run over if he hadn’t been able to move.
“It is very clear that … Simmons was going to do anything to get away,” the attorney said. “It becomes pretty ironic after you find out Simmons has felony warrants … and been in prison.”
Simmons also was charged Friday. He is accused in a felony count of assaulting the officer with an automobile and in a misdemeanor count of stealing a TV from Walmart.
Simmons has spent time in prison for drug offenses, assault, robbery, and unauthorized use of a vehicle, records show. At the time of the shooting, he was facing arrest on a 2019 drug trafficking charge.
Simmons is being held in the Oklahoma County jail. His July 5 booking photo shows he has a large bandage on his head.
