The man who was shot and killed by Broward Sheriff’s Office deputies on Wednesday afternoon in Oakland Park after a standoff has been identified as 51-year-old Alexander Staal.
Oakland Park District Crime Suppression Team detectives were searching for Staal because he was wanted for multiple felony charges stemming from a domestic violence incident that happened on Sunday in Oakland Park, including attempted kidnapping, burglary of a dwelling with battery, aggravated stalking after injunction for protection and domestic battery, the Sheriff’s Office said in a news release Thursday.
Staal was found inside his car parked in the 800 block of East Prospect Road about 2:30 p.m., and he refused to follow deputies’ orders as they attempted to get him to surrender. Shortly before 3 p.m., a “confrontation” happened after the standoff, “and deputies were forced to fire their weapons,” the Sheriff’s Office said.
Three deputies shot at Staal, whom Oakland Park Fire Rescue pronounced dead at the scene, according to BSO. The deputies were not injured and have been placed on administrative assignment as the Florida Department of Law Enforcement investigates.
Aerial footage from several TV news stations showed a dark-colored SUV with bullet holes through the windshield. Sheriff’s Office spokesperson Carey Codd said on Wednesday that preliminary information indicated the “confrontation” happened outside of the car.
The Sheriff’s Office did not release further information about the confrontation or the domestic incident from Sunday.
Staal had three previous domestic-violence related cases in Broward County and one stalking-violence related case since early 2023, court records show, all involving the same woman.
A woman who has two minor children with Staal received a temporary protective injunction against him in February 2023 that was in effect until May. He violated the order at least once by contacting her and driving by her house, the woman wrote in the affidavit of violation. She wrote that a previous wife had also received a restraining order against him in another state.
The woman wrote in a supplemental affidavit in that case that her mother, who lives in Russia, received a message from Staal that said, in part, “your daughter is going to come to you soon … in parts.”
“Since this message, I’m in fear for my life even more,” she wrote in the affidavit.
The State Attorney’s Office in August 2023 declined to charge Staal criminally for violating the order, according to a closeout memo in the case. The protective order expired in May.
The most recent case against him was filed in June. The same woman wrote in her petition that she saw Staal near her apartment, and he took a picture of her balcony and posted it on social media. He also sent her threatening messages, she wrote, and that she was in fear for her and her children’s lives.
A judge granted the woman a protective order against stalking in June that was in effect until further order from the court, according to court records.
The Sheriff’s Office has not identified the victim of the domestic incident Sunday in Oakland Park.