2 Men Shot on Seamanship Trail in Seminole Woods; Sheriff Looking For Woman of Interest

Last Updated: Tuesday, 12:16 p.m.

Two men were critically wounded in a shooting involving “a lot” of gunshots after midnight this morning outside 28 Seamanship Trail, Sheriff Rick Staly said from the scene.

The men involved in the shooting were identified in late morning as Tristan George, 18, who lives at the 28 Seamantrail house, and Michael McRoberts, 21, whose last known address, when he was booked at bthe county jail last July, was 72 Edwards Drive in Palm Coast.

Sheriff’s detectives are looking for a woman, a person of interest, who drove McRoberts to Florida Hospital Flagler in a dark-gray Honda Accord. McRoberts was later taken by ambulance to Halifax hospital in Daytona Beach. George was taken to Halifax directly from Seamanship Trail, by Flagler County Fire Rescue.

The case is still very murky, Staly said. Detectives have spoken to one of the two men. The other is still sedated after surgery.

McRoberts gave a false name to hospital authorities when he got to Florida Hospital: he already had a warrant out for his arrest, because of a probation violation over a grand theft conviction. (The name he gave was that of Nathaniel Blumenfeld, the brother of Trevor Blumenfeld, who was shot in November 2013 near his home in the LL Section.) He was correctly identified through Rapid ID technology. He has a long jail record and has previously faced charges as a habitual jail offender, stemming from charges of theft, burglary, illegal possession of prescription drugs, grand theft, and the like. But he does not appear to have charges or convictions for any violent-crime offenses.

“There is more to this story than we are being told by the victims,” Staly said, referring to the victims as “victims-slash-suspects.”

The shooting, he said, involved “a lot” of gunshots, according to evidence being recovered by the Crime Scene Investigation unit still at the scene. “CSI is still processing the scene but based on the evidence there was a lot.”

George was shot twice, a spokesperson later said, and McRoberts once. It’s not clear where the men were shot, though a 911 call released in early afternoon shed some light on the situation immediately after the shooting.

“My son just got shot, my son just got shot,” Michelle George, the 44-year-old mother of Tristan George, tells the 911 dispatcher in a call placed at three minutes after midnight today. She had been asleep at the time of the shooting and was woken up when her son walked into her room bleeding, and told her to call 911, according to an incident report released Tuesday.

“We don’t know who it was, who was it?” she says, asking her son. She tells the dispatcher her son was shot in the back of the head but was able to talk to her. She begs for a hurried response. She doesn’t know where the shooter went, but she says “he left in a vehicle,” which she described as a two-door Mustang convertible–not a Honda Accord–driven by a girl. Further into the 9-minute call, George is heard in the background saying, “Yeah, I shot back,” and the woman tells the dispatcher that “the guns are right here,” referring to the guns in the plural.

But Michelle sounds more out of sorts than her son: someone in the background tells her to “come down” and to be quiet, as she is, he tells her, making matters worse. From the chatter in the background there are at least two men in the house, including the victim. The other is Christopher Rivera, 19, who rents a room at 28 Seamanship Trail. One of them twice tells the woman to hang up. She then appears to be having difficulties breathing, but relays the information that her son has been shot on the right side in back of the neck. The victim is heard saying that the incident happened “right in front of the house.”

“Oh my God,” the Michelle George moans, “why would they do this?” By then it’s five to six minutes into the call. Deputies have not reached the house, the 911 dispatcher tells the woman, because the woman is not telling him where the guns are. The dispatcher asks her to let him speak to her son, who seems “calmer.” But another man takes the phone and tells the dispatcher that “there is one” gun in the house but “it’s way far away from him,” meaning George. George himself, the man says, “is on the bed right now. I’ve got him upright.” The 911 dispatcher asks for the gun to be placed in a safe or a safer place.

George’s mother has been interviewed by detectives and was at Halifax hospital with her son in the middle of the afternoon.

The shooting took place outside the house but while there was the potential for neighboring houses to be struck by stray bullets, Staly said in this case the shots were concentrated on the property itself.

Detectives have secured a search warrant, which was served this morning. But that search warrant was related only to the shooting–and did uncover a handgun, which is believed to have been involved in the shooting–a 40-caliber Smith & Wesson found on a chair in George’s room. It’s not yet known if another weapon was also involved. As they were searching the house, detectives saw in plain sight some marijuana and paraphernalia, leading them to then seek a second search warrant, that one for drugs, to be served later today.

Neighbors said they were not familiar with the individuals in the house, saying only that they were recent arrivals to the neighborhood.

The sheriff’s office released surveillance-video captures of the car of the woman, and the woman herself, captured at Florida Hospital Flagler, in hopes of getting public help identifying the person.

By mid-afternoon, the vehicle the sheriff’s office was seeking was found–a Honda Accord–and towed to the Sheriff’s Office, and the woman was identified as Brooklynn Marino. But Marino herself is still being sought as a person of interest. She is now velieved to be driving a 2013 Nissan Altima with Florida tag IISS74.

George has had one arrest as an adult, back in March, for tampering or destroying evidence, a felony, and possession of less than 20 grams of marijuana. Both charges were dropped.

A man walked freely outside the house, near a sheriff’s patrol car. Officials at the scene identified him as one of the renters in the house. He apparently had not been at the house at the time of the shooting. There was a kennel with a small animal inside, sitting at the edge of the property being searched. The animal was quiet. A sheriff’s spokesperson explained later this morning that it was the “family dog” at 28 Seamanship Trail, part dachshund, part chihuahua.

Staly stressed that there is no threat to the community. “I don’t think so,” he said, “so if I’m correct on what we believe the reason for this incident is, it’s very localized, it’s very specific, so I don’t think the community needs to be concerned.”

Officials were not disclosing the reason for the shooting, but based on recent patterns, the shooting appeared to have all the telltale signs of a drug matter gone wrong.

And that in fact is what they said officially as the day wore on, and as half-pound of marijuana, Adderall prescription pills, drug paraphernalia, scales, and packaging materials typically used for the sale of drugs were recovered from the house after a search.

“All indications point to criminal activity involving drugs and guns that went bad,” Sheriff Staly said. “If you deal poison in this community, this is a hazard of your occupation. I am thankful that no innocent persons were hurt. I am confident that our detectives will make arrests in the future.”

If you have any information on the location of Brooklynn Marino, please contact the Sheriff’s Office at 386-313-4911 or call Crimestoppers at 1-888-277-TIPS (8477) to remain anonymous. You could be eligible for a reward up to $1,000.00.