What started as a simple teenage prank, ended in gunshots and an arrest. 5 students from a Jacksonville, Florida private school admitted to police they had been driving around town, "throwing cheese" from their car at a stoplight when things escalated when they threw cheese at Dr. Bruce Mitchell's Range Rover. Dr. Bruce wasn't amused by the prank. He aggressively tailed the teens and waved a gun out of his window and fired a round into the air which caused the teen driver to speed up and peel away as fast as he could. Another teen frantically called 911 from inside the car and told police they were in fear of their lives. Mitchell allegedly stopped following the teens after police passed them, and he drove off in a different direction. He was stopped by police a short time later. The doctor stepped out of his car without being directed, court documents show, with officers drawing their weapons and ordering him to surrender before he complied. A Sig Sauer pistol was found in Mitchell’s glovebox, with a loaded magazine on the passenger seat and a spent bullet cartridge lying in the footwell. After his arrest, Mitchell told police, “They shot at me first” before refusing to speak, court documents show. No weapons were found in the teens’ car.
Mitchell is charged with discharge of a weapon from a vehicle and aggravated assault with a deadly weapon without intent to kill. He was released on bond after being booked. The doctor previously served as director of Hospital Medicine at Emory University, according to his LinkedIn profile, and served at the Jacksonville Mayo Clinic for 14 years.