Recently Released Felon Tased and Arrested Following Knife Attack on Flagler County Sheriff’s Deputy

Fifteen months ago Andrew Mark Williams, 35 at the time, was arrested on four felony charges, including battery on a law enforcement officer, resisting arrest with violence and criminal mischief after damaging $5,000-worth of items at his house, where sheriff’s deputies had to gain entry by forcing the garage door. He kicked and spat at deputies and injured one of them.

He pleaded to three of the felonies and was sentenced to prison for a year. He was in state prison until last October. He’d served a previous state prison stint on drug charges in 2022 and 2023.

On Thursday, after Flagler County Sheriff’s deputies again gained entry into a house by forcing the garage door after Williams had barricaded himself inside, Williams was again arrested. He was charged with battery on a law enforcement officer, whom he injured with a knife, and six other felonies. He was tased into compliance.

He was drunk and had locked his 90-year-old grandmother and his aunt out of their house, and was inside with his 91-year-old grandfather, when the relatives called 911. Deputies gained entry into the house with the homeowner’s permission. (His address is listed as 1 Shadow Lane in Ormond Beach.)

Williams was on the kitchen floor when deputies entered. He stood up, became aggressive, unhappy with the deputies entering the house, and walked back toward the kitchen counter. “It was at this moment that I saw [Williams] arm himself with a sharp knife,” a deputy reported in Williams’s arrest report. “I called out ‘knife’ to warn the other Deputies of [Williams]’s condition. When I grabbed [Williams]’s left arm he actively engaged in physically resisting Deputies by pulling and pushing towards and against Deputy Bifano, Deputy Rainey and I. During the struggle, [Williams] cut my left hand with the knife.”

The injured deputy took out a Taser and fired two probes at Williams. Even then, Williams refused to follow commands, “aggressively tensing and refusing to put his hands behind his back,” leading the deputy to fire a third probe. Williams then complied. He refused medical assistance. He was taken to AdventHealth Palm Coast on State Road 100. The deputy was bandaged.

“Our deputies displayed extreme restraint in dealing with this violent and armed drunk,” Sheriff Rick Staly was quoted as saying in a release. “Our deputies exercised sound, professional judgment by deploying a Taser to stop the threat and bring this incident to a conclusion, but the reality is this could have ended much differently. This guy was a slow learner but after two zaps with a Taser, he finally came to his senses and quit resisting. I commend our deputies for using less-lethal weapons when legally they could have used deadly force. This is exactly why we train extensively in de-escalation tactics.”

The deputy was not seriously injured. Williams faces seven felony charges, including elder abuse, three counts of resisting officers with violence, and three counts of aggravated assault. He was being held on $20,000 bond.