Video shows Utah child, 4, shoot at police outside McDonald’s drive-thru

Utah police have released body-camera footage showing a Feb. 12 incident in which a 4-year-old shot at police officers at a McDonald’s drive-thru in Midvale.

Officers with the Unified Police Department were responding to reports that a male suspect allegedly brandished a firearm at McDonald’s employees due to an incorrect order around 1:30 p.m. local time, and, once officers arrived and began to detain 27-year-old Sadaat Johnson, a child in the backseat of his vehicle fired a gun at the responders.

In the body-camera footage from the Unified Police Department released to FOX 13 Utah, officers can be heard telling two distraught children, ages 3 and 4, in the backseat of Johnson’s vehicle, “It’s okay,” after one of the 4-year-old children fired a single shot. 

Police initially detained Johnson after they asked him to exit his vehicle, and he refused to cooperate, according to a press release from the police department. Footage shows officers forcibly removing the suspect from the driver’s seat and handcuffing him on the ground.

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During that time, an officer noticed a gun pointing from a rear window of Johnson’s vehicle, at which point he alerted other officers to the gun and pushed it “to the side as a round was fired,” the press release states. He also alerted other officers that it was a “kid” who fired the weapon.

A preliminary investigation indicated that the 27-year-old instructed his child to shoot at officers, police said.

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Court records obtained by FOX 13 revealed that the child shot at officers because “he wanted his daddy back.” 

“To have an adult think it is okay to encourage a [4]-year-old to pull a firearm and shoot at police illustrates how out of hand the campaign against police has gotten,” Sheriff Rosie Rivera said in a February statement after the incident. “This needs to stop and we need to come together as a community to find solutions to the challenges we face in our neighborhoods. Officers are here to protect and serve and we are beyond belief that something like [this] could happen.”

Utah authorities charged Johnson with child abuse, aggravated assault and interference with an arresting officer after the incident, according to FOX 13.