Charlotte County Sheriff Bill Prummell said deputies received a call at approximately 12:30 p.m. about a person who was shot along Malone Avenue. The sheriff said that the victim died from their wounds. A search for Cross, who was identified as the suspect in the incident, began shortly after.<\/p>\n
At approximately 1:20 p.m., two community policing deputies were doing bicycle patrols in the area of Yorkshire Street and Hillsborough Boulevard.<\/p>\n
People who came from a homeless camp reportedly told deputies that Cross was in the woods and pointed a gun at them.<\/p>\n
Prummell said two deputies then went into the woods, Cross shot at them, and deputies fired back, Prummell said.<\/p>\n
Cross later came out of the woods near Hillsborough Boulevard. According to Prummell, Cross pointed a gun at his head before pointing it at law enforcement.<\/p>\n
The sheriff said seven members from multiple agencies, five North Port police officers, and two CCSO deputies, then shot and killed him. <\/p>\n
Gulf Coast News reporter Natacha Casal was at the scene along Yorkshire Street and Veterans Boulevard and heard multiple gunshots before announcing there was no longer a threat.<\/p>\n
The area remains active with law enforcement from North Port Police and the Florida Highway Patrol, also on scene. <\/p>\n
There was also a large deputy presence near Kenilworth Boulevard in Port Charlotte<\/a>, where CCSO said a shot was fired.<\/p>\n During the search, CCSO posted a photo of Cross.<\/p>\n \t\t \n\t\tCharlotte County Sheriff’s Office\t<\/p>\n The law enforcement activity prompted six school lockdowns. <\/p>\n The following schools were temporarily put on soft lockdown due to the investigation in that area, which has since been lifted.<\/p>\n Liberty ElementaryNeil Armstrong ElementaryPeace River ElementaryCharlotte Harbor CenterPort Charlotte MiddleKingsway ElementaryPeace River ElementaryCharlotte Harbor Center<\/p>\n A soft lockdown is implemented when there is a potential or nearby threat not inside the school. Classes continue, while doors are locked and movement around campus is limited. <\/p>\n This is a developing story and will be updated.<\/p>\n DOWNLOAD\u202fthe free\u202fGulf Coast News app<\/a>\u202ffor your latest news and alerts on breaking news, weather, sports, entertainment, and more on your phone or tablet. And check out the Very Local Gulf Coast app<\/a> to stream news, entertainment and original programming on your TV.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A manhunt in Charlotte County is now over, and lockdowns at six schools were lifted, as two large…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":555222,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[43547,4,450,107278,246713,88,53939,451,30757,16641,246714,3,8293,119305,14857,19630,1079,14853,452,453,2986],"class_list":["post-555221","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-breaking-news","tag-alert","tag-breaking-news","tag-breakingnews","tag-charlotte-county-deputy","tag-deputy-presence","tag-entertainment","tag-gulf-coast-news","tag-headlines","tag-indoor","tag-late-news","tag-malone-avenue-monday-afternoon","tag-news","tag-phone","tag-port-charlotte","tag-resident","tag-run","tag-sport","tag-suspect","tag-top-stories","tag-topstories","tag-weather"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/555221","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=555221"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/555221\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/555222"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=555221"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=555221"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=555221"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"Deputies](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/ccso-picture-of-matthew-ryan-cross-suspect-in-maolne-ave-scene-69cab9c77d2a9.jpg\"\/ "\\"Deputies")
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