ARLINGTON, Tenn. — The Tennessee Bureau of Investigation is looking into what happened during a deputy-involved shooting in Arlington.
It happened around 10 p.m. Saturday at a home in the 9500 block of Osborn Road.
The TBI said, according to initial reports, two Shelby County Sheriff’s Office deputies responded to a domestic call at that address.
“All I know is that it was a domestic call where there was an individual exhibiting some sort of violent behavior,” said Susan Niland, one of the public information officers for the TBI. “The officers responded, I believe in about 10 minutes from that, and Mr. Lawson was either already outside or had just gotten outside when the officers arrived,” she said.
Per TBI reports, when they got there, Jimmy Lee Lawson, 48, came toward them in the driveway and threatened them with a knife.
“Both deputies fired upon Lawson, striking and killing him,” said Niland.
Lawson has a history of domestic assault charges and was registered as a sex offender in Tennessee.
In 2010, he was convicted of sexually assaulting a woman as she slept.
Court records show Lawson became so aggressive with responding officers in that case that they had to use “physical force.”
Saturday night’s call from Lawson’s wife was the third she’s made just this year — the first was in June.
According to the affidavit, Lawson was upset about being put on the sex offender registry and hit his wife in the face, then resisted arrest and was pepper-sprayed by deputies.
Lawson was on probation for that crime — when less than two months ago — deputies were called to the house a second time.
Court records show he was “belligerent,” and deputies had to pepper-spray him again.
It’s still unclear whether the deputies in Saturday night’s deadly shooting were wearing body cameras, and the Shelby County Sheriff’s Office says it won’t release their names until the investigation is complete.
When the TBI finishes its investigation of the shooting, it will turn over the findings to the district attorney general.
