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•Security footage from Paradise Liquors and Bealls shows the confrontation between Mike Ledford and Dylan Deschaine before Ledford’s death.
•Deschaine’s defense team has filed a motion to dismiss charges based on Florida’s stand-your-ground law.
•The judge in the case will hold a hearing to dismiss the charges based on stand your ground laws December 19.
UPDATE: The Okaloosa County Courts have let Mid Bay News that the hearing for dismissal has been cancelled.
A newly-obtained business security video has revealed a little more information about what happened the night that Mike Ledford, a beloved local restauranteur, died.
Mid Bay News received this video as Deschaine’s court-appointed attorney, Michael Weinstock, made a motion to dismiss the case – and will argue for the dismissal based on stand-your-ground laws in Florida.
Florida’s stand-your-ground laws allow someone to use or threaten to use force against another person when they reasonably believe the conduct is necessary to defend against another person’s use of unlawful force that could cause imminent death or great bodily harm, and they have the right to be where they are.
The series of videos – obtained by Mid Bay News through a records request – shows a confrontation inside the Paradise Liquors store between Dylan Deschaine, Mike Ledford’s alleged killer, and Ledford himself.
Grainy security footage from the Bealls store in the same strip center where Deschaine allegedly stabbed Ledford gives several more clues as to what happened immediately before his death as well.
Mid Bay News obtained the evidence as part of a records request submitted concerning the case that the State Attorney’s Office will present should the charges against Deschaine go to trial in court.
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In the first series of videos obtained by Mid Bay News, a video camera shows a man who fits Dylan Deschaine’s description in a black Los Angeles Lakers jersey sweater entering Paradise Liquors in the Oak Creek Shopping Center in Niceville.
The clothes would be different than the white sweater Niceville Police Chief David Popwell would arrest Deschaine in several hours later.
RELATED: New Body Camera Video Shows How Arrest Of Deschaine By Niceville Police Went Down.
The video shows Deschaine enter at 8:48 PM and cuts off about a minute later.
A second video, which starts at 8:52 PM, shows Deschaine at the front counter. He appears to pick up two small plastic bottles of alcohol from the counter and walks to the attendant at the register farther away from the entrance while also using his phone. He opens his wallet and begins to fumble around with it and search his pockets for approximately 30 seconds before someone matching Mike Ledford’s appearance steps into line behind him.
Ledford seems to say something to Deschaine; we don’t know what, as the video has no audio to accompany it. Deschaine turns to face Ledford and appears to respond before completing his purchase.
After finishing up at the register – Deschaine dances and makes a face at Ledford before starting out the door. Once in the doorway, Deschaine addresses Ledford again.
Ledford responds.
Deschaine opens the other sliding glass door and continues to speak with Ledford.
Ledford leaves his items and the register and starts to walk toward Deschaine. His first couple of steps are measured – at a regular gait. But as he closes on Deschaine, his disposition becomes aggressive, and he lunges at Deschaine – grabbing him by his sweater near his neck. With one effort, he pushes Deschaine out of the door and out onto the sidewalk outside the liquor store.
Through the tinted glass of the storefront, filled with glare from the neon of the advertisements inside, we can see Ledford land at least one punch on Deschaine before the intertwined pair move out of the camera’s sight to the west of the liquor store. It’s 8:53 PM.
Ten seconds after he moves out of frame, Ledford walks back into the store – apparently unharmed. The customer behind Ledford in line defers to him and allows him to pay for his alcohol. The video ends.
Bealls provided two security videos for the police investigation. The first appears to have been recorded from the top of the strip center. The second seems to be from inside the building at the front doors, facing out toward the parking lot.
At 8:55 and 54 seconds, three minutes after the encounter between Deschaine and Ledford which ended in at least one punch from Ledford on Deschaine, a Bealls security camera catches Deschaine cross the parking lot from the northwest (where the Sherwin Williams is located) to the southeast – apparently where Ledford parked his black truck.
A second camera inside the Bealls that faces the entrance and out into the parking lot shows a Black truck like Mike Ledford’s stop as a person walks toward it at 8:56 and 16 seconds. Three seconds later, the video shows the truck’s driver emerge from the vehicle and move quickly toward the person walking near the truck. A bystander stops between the altercation and the building to watch what happens.
At 8:57 and 47 seconds, the security camera witnesses Ledford’s truck rolling across the nearly empty parking lot to the power converter, where the car was found by police when they cordoned off the area and began their investigation.
Less than a minute later, the bystander we saw in the tape from the inside of Bealls can be seen on the security tape from above the strip center running across the parking lot to the west with his arm up as if he is holding a cell phone.
Niceville Police arrive on the scene and blocked off the entrance to the parking row closest to the CVS drug store at 9:02 and 33 seconds. The Officer gets out and goes around to the back of his patrol car. A second, seemingly older man also exits the vehicle.
Another officer approaches from the southeast, from John Sims Parkway, on foot.
At 9:03, the man who appeared to be on the phone returns with an Okaloosa Sheriff’s deputy. The man runs to meet the Officer who approached from John Sims Parkway. The Sheriff’s deputy the man was with turns to face the direction they came from as the man and the Officer moved toward an area in the parking lot Ledford’s truck came from.
The man who seemed to call in the request for help then breaks off from law enforcement and heads toward a small group of people who gathered at the entrance to the CVS before the video ends.
The trial process for Deschaine in this case has been continued several times – which means either the prosecution or the defense has asked for extensions while they get their evidence together.
At least one extension was provided by the court so that Deschaine could have a psychological evaluation.
Deschaine has a motion hearing on Dec 19 that is related to the stand-your-ground defense his attorney, Michael Weinstock, is pursuing on his behalf. Deschaine has spent the last eight months in jail on charges of murder and two counts of assault and battery on a law enforcement officer. The judge in this case denied bond for the murder charge and set bond at $200,000 for the battery on a law enforcement officer.
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