A Fort Lauderdale corrections officer was arrested late Tuesday on a charge of first-degree murder after he was seen carrying a child and running from the scene of an overnight shooting in Coral Springs.
Police found a woman inside of an apartment at the scene with a gunshot wound to the head, according to police radio archives.
Chase Harder, 21, surrendered late Tuesday night. Coral Springs police have not released the name, age or gender of the victim because their family has not been notified.
Harder was hired by the Fort Lauderdale Police Department in June of 2022 as a detention officer, records show.
He has been placed on administrative leave without pay during the investigation, Det. Ali Adamson, a spokesperson for the department, said in a media release. He is an Army Reserves veteran.
Coral Springs Police issued a statement Wednesday morning offering few details about the murder. Several 911 calls came in about 8:26 p.m. Tuesday reporting shots fired at the 9200 block of Ramblewood Drive, the statement said. A man later identified as Harder was seen carrying a small child over his shoulder and running from the scene into a white Mercedes, which fled the scene.
The calls mostly came from an apartment complex on Ramblewood Drive, according to police radio archives. A dispatcher told officers that residents had reported hearing a woman screaming and a man and a woman yelling. One caller said he heard four gunshots.
Officers arrived at the apartment complex, where they reported seeing blood coming from one of the apartments and found a woman with a gunshot wound to the head. She was declared dead at the scene soon after.
The dispatcher ran a check on past incidents at the apartment and told officers that on July 30, units had responded to a call about a woman receiving threatening texts from an ex-husband, according to the radio archives.
Later on, the child’s father called 911 to say Harder had dropped off the child at his home, according to the police summary of the incident. Harder then contacted police and turned himself in.
It was not immediately clear Wednesday what Harder’s relationship was with the victim, the child or the child’s father.
The Fort Lauderdale Police Department posted a congratulatory note on social media in December, describing Harder as the first graduate of the Broward College Institute of Public Safety’s Basic Corrections Academy in 20 years. “Chase Harder was identified as a detention officer and will work in our Prisoner Intake Processing Facility,” Fort Lauderdale police said in last year’s announcement.
“The details surrounding these allegations are very difficult to hear and do not reflect the character and professionalism expected of the men and women of our agency,” Adamson said in the release Wednesday.
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