Leah Baker: Florida woman stabbed officer with butcher knife before she was shot dead, shows bodycam footage
JACKSONVILLE, FLORIDA: Newly-released bodycam footage captured the moment a Florida woman lunged at a police officer with a knife and stabbed her before she was shot herself after refusing to drop her weapon. The shocking incident unfolded at the Jacksonville home of Leah Baker, a 29-year-old mother who suffered from mental health problems, on April 11, according to the Daily Mail. Baker had called the police after an argument with her housemate about medication and what was supposed to be a routine call quickly escalated into violence.
Footage from the bodycam of Officer Elizabeth Mechling, a rookie who had been on the force for a year, showed her arriving at Baker's home on Golfair Boulevard, knocking on her door, and then stepping back. After a few seconds, Baker rushes through the door with a butcher knife and swings it at Mechling, who instinctively raises her arms to protect herself.
"I've just been fu****g stabbed," she can be heard yelling a second later as she runs back into the yard and pulls out her gun. Baker eventually drops her knife after the officer shouts at her but once again goes to pick it up after she's ordered to lie on the ground. Mechling fires two shots, causing the mom to drop the knife again. At this point, Sgt JC Nobles, an off-duty officer who has 18 years of experience on the force, arrived at the scene to help. They both yell at Baker to get down on the ground but the 29-year-old manages to grab the knife and rush at Nobles, who fires four shots at her.
She fell holding onto the knife as additional officers arrived on the scene as backup. Even as she lay bleeding, Baker begins punching a K-9 who grabbed her leg, much to the anger of another officer who can be heard yelling, "Stop hitting my dog!" as he wrestled the knife away from her possession. The dog eventually dragged her into the street, where she was placed in handcuffs.
Baker was transported to a hospital for treatment but did not survive her injuries. Following her death, her mom said she didn't condone her daughter's actions but questioned if lethal force was necessary considering she suffered from mental illnesses.
In August, the State Attorney's Office ruled that the shots fired by Mechling and Holmes were justified, a view that was shared by crime and safety expert Ken Jefferson, who said incidents such as these were a warning to those clamoring for the police to be defunded.
"A mentally ill person just like a sane person can kill you and you've got to protect yourself and protect others so the officers did right to use deadly force," he told News4Jax. "Everyday citizens put their life on the line for the citizens of their community that they represent and that video is just a snippet of some of the things they have to go through in order to be able to go home to their families."
"Mechling had the right to pull her weapon from the moment she was stabbed," he continued. "She exercises officer safety as we see in the video, when she knocks on the door she steps back. She could have easily stabbed her in the upper torso or even in the face or neck area."