Weapon Used For The Purpose

Here is a story, we probably won't hear about. A boy saved his family from an intruder, by shooting the man with his father's gun. In a city such as Miami, where homicides go unsolved and like other homicides, senseless. Props to the young man and the paper for publishing a story of a weapon used for the right purpose...


HOLLYWOOD
Intruder shot by teen with two guns
A 15-year-old shot an intruder who broke into his family's Hollywood home early Saturday morning.

BY JENNIFER LEBOVICH
jlebovich@MiamiHerald.com
CANDACE WEST/MIAMI HERALD STAFF
FAMILY'S HERO: Javaris Granger, 15, used a gun to protect his family.
More photos


Maxine Chandler thought she would faint in the wee hours of Saturday when she heard a knock at her door and opened it, only to have a man lunge toward her.
She slammed the door shut and watched the 6-foot-tall man banging a bicycle against the front of her house -- repeatedly hitting the window and the door.
Chandler's screaming and crying roused her 15-year-old son, Javaris Granger, who came to see what was wrong.
Javaris went to his mother's bedroom and loaded the two handguns his father keeps for protection in the home in the 700 block of South 61st Avenue. The family also called 911.
The man -- later identified by police as Keil Jumper -- kicked the door off its hinges and barged into the home about 3:30 a.m. Jumper, 22, lives on the Seminoles' reservation near Hollywood.
Javaris, who is 5-foot-6 and weighs about 125 pounds, took cover behind a wall, armed with a gun in each hand. One of the guns was a .38 caliber, but family members said Tuesday night they were unsure about the other gun.
''He was going crazy,'' Javaris said. ``I shot one time to let him know he had to leave. The dude didn't leave. He was looking at my eyes, trying to get closer.''
The gun in Javaris' right hand jammed, and he fired with the gun in his left, sending Jumper running from the single-story home. Javaris thought his shots missed the man, simply scaring him off.
''I was real scared. . . . When I was shooting, my main focus was protecting my mom and family,'' Javaris said.
Police found Jumper lying on the ground a few houses away, shot multiple times and bleeding from his wounds, said Hollywood police Capt. Tony Rode.
Jumper was taken to Memorial Regional Hospital in Hollywood, where he was in serious condition Tuesday night.
''Preliminary investigation suggests it was a justifiable shooting, and the 15-year-old won't be charged,'' Rode said.
Police said the family did not know Jumper. Records show Jumper has served time in prison for cocaine possession, criminal mischief and throwing a deadly projectile into a home.
He was arrested Feb. 19 for battery and larceny and again on March 28 for larceny.
On Friday, the day before he allegedly broke into the Chandler home, Jumper was arrested by Seminole police for assault on an officer and resisting an officer.
Jumper is expected to face felony burglary charges once he is discharged from the hospital, Rode said.
Javaris protected the 11 other family members in the house -- including four children under age two, Chandler said.
''We didn't want to hurt anyone, but we had to do what we had to do,'' Chandler said. ``When he got in here he had to shoot him.''
Chandler's husband had gone to the hospital to check on a co-worker and rushed home after getting his wife's frantic phone calls. ''I'm just glad my family is OK,'' said Lyndon Chandler, Maxine's husband. ``Listening to the screaming was terrifying.''
The silver 20-inch bicycle that Jumper used left tread marks on the front door, under a wreath adorned with a wooden American flag. The family is still shaken.
''I keep visualizing his face in the window with the bike over his head,'' said Javaris' cousin, T'ontea Lopez. Now, when Lopez goes to make a bottle for her son at night, she ducks down on her way to the kitchen.
``If my cousin wasn't here, we would have been so scared. He saved us.''