After a crash and a freezing weekend search, a Middleburg family is questioning police actions prior to the discovery of Austin Fuller’s body.<\/p>\n
JACKSONVILLE, Fla. \u2014 The family of a Middleburg man found dead near Cecil airport said missed opportunities have cost them the chance to find him alive.<\/p>\n
Austin Fuller, 30, was found dead in an embankment near Normandy Boulevard and Cecil Airport days after his family said he disappeared following a crash on Saturday. His parents said they searched for him in freezing temperatures while repeatedly asking the Jacksonville Sheriff\u2019s Office for help.<\/p>\n
\u201cHe was such a good person,\u201d said his mother, Tammy Miller. \u201cHe didn\u2019t deserve to die like this.\u201d<\/p>\n
Miller said Fuller lived at home with his parents and left Saturday afternoon, Jan. 31, to attend a Jacksonville Icemen hockey game. Before he left, she warned him about the unusually cold temperatures expected that night.<\/p>\n
\u201cBe careful. It\u2019s freezing out tonight. I love you,\u201d Miller said. \u201cHe said, \u2018I love you too, mom.\u2019 That was the last time I ever talked to him.\u201d<\/p>\n
Around 10 p.m., the family says they received a phone call informing them Fuller had been involved in a crash near Normandy Boulevard. Miller says Fuller called her husband shortly afterward, sounding disoriented and panicked.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cHe kept telling us, \u2018Get to me. Don\u2019t hang up,\u2019\u201d Miller said. \u201cHe didn\u2019t even know where he was.\u201d<\/p>\n
When the family arrived at the crash scene, they said Fuller was gone. His vehicle remained, as did his jacket, despite temperatures dropping near freezing.<\/p>\n
The family said Fuller appeared to have hit his head on the windshield, and Miller, who works in the medical field, said she immediately worried he could be suffering from a concussion.<\/p>\n
\u201cMy baby was out there running around somewhere with a head injury,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n
The family also said a friend later told them Fuller had made a troubling statement in a phone call after the crash, suggesting he wanted to harm himself. Miller said they shared that information with officers at the scene.<\/p>\n
Miller said officers told them Fuller would not be considered a missing person because he left the scene of the crash.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Despite the response, the family said they continued searching through the night. Fuller never came home.<\/p>\n
By Sunday, Miller said more than 30 friends and relatives organized a search effort. They said they repeatedly called JSO asking for assistance, citing the cold temperatures and Fuller\u2019s distressed state.<\/p>\n
On Monday, searchers found footprints near the POW-MIA Memorial Parkway. Using horses, ATVs, and a privately hired drone, the group expanded the search.<\/p>\n
That\u2019s when Fuller\u2019s body was found in an embankment.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt was Austin laying there,\u201d Miller said. \u201cHe froze to death.\u201d<\/p>\n
JSO confirmed to First Coast News that a warrant was issued for Fuller for leaving the scene of the crash before his body was discovered.<\/p>\n
In a statement, JSO said:<\/p>\n
\u201cA suspect having an active arrest warrant and actively avoiding contact with police would not be listed as a subject of a missing persons report. Mr. Fuller was being sought by police for criminal violations following the hit-and-run crash he was involved in.\u201d<\/p>\n
Miller disputes the idea that her son was \u201cactively avoiding\u201d police and said the family was prepared to bring him in.<\/p>\n
\u201cI shouldn\u2019t be burying my son over a misdemeanor,\u201d she said. \u201cNobody was hurt in that crash.\u201d<\/p>\n
JSO has not yet responded to follow-up questions about whether officers conducted any active search efforts before Fuller was found.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"After a crash and a freezing weekend search, a Middleburg family is questioning police actions prior to the…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":142818,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[116,118,117],"class_list":{"0":"post-142817","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-jacksonville","8":"tag-jacksonville","9":"tag-jacksonville-headlines","10":"tag-jacksonville-news"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/142817","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=142817"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/142817\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/142818"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=142817"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=142817"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=142817"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}