Pasco County deputies released surveillance video Thursday of a suspect sought in a hate crime investigation.
According to the Pasco County Sheriff's Office, a man and his girlfriend were shopping at the Walmart on Land O' Lakes Boulevard early Wednesday when the suspect began harassing them.
The suspect believed the man was from the Middle East. As the man and his girlfriend were approaching their car, the suspect came up to them and made several comments and then shot the man in the face with a pellet gun, according to officials.
Bay News 9 spoke exclusively with the victim off-camera. He said he is still very fearful for his life and didn't want us to show his face or even use his name but he took us through what happened step by step.
The video released Thursday afternoon shows the victim and his girlfriend, and another shopper walking toward the entrance of a Land O’ Lakes Walmart. The suspect followed closely behind.
The suspect then began talking to the victim, asking first if he is Middle Eastern and then if he is Muslim.
The victim told Bay News 9 that he said no to both. The victim's parents are from Trinidad and he was born and raised in Tampa.
After the questions, the suspect begins shouting racial slurs.
Detectives said the suspect raises his pellet gun and shoots the victim point blank in the face, firing off at least 20 shots, even some while running away.
The victim said he still has two pellets lodged in his face; one in his cheek and the other just above his eyebrow.
"Had that been a 22, a 38, any type caliber real gun, he'd be dead," says Detective Lisa Schoneman, at Thursday's news conference. "He knows that and he's mortified. It's changed his world forever. "
The sheriff's office said several witnesses, including a store employee putting away shopping carts at the time, back up the victim's story.
Along with the suspect, detectives are looking for other witnesses inside the store. The surveillance video shows the suspect stopping to talk to two women shortly before the shooting.
"Please call us up. Because if this suspect can do this, who knows what's next," says Sheriff Chris Nocco. "Please turn him in."
The Florida chapter of the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR-FL) is offering a $1,000 cash reward to the first person who provides police with information that leads to the arrest and conviction of the suspect.
If you have any information, you're asked to contact the sheriff's office at 727-844-7711 or to leave an anonymous message call 1-800-706-2488. For any emergency, please call 911.
The suspect is described as a white male, about 6-feet-tall, 180 pounds with dirty blonde hair, cut high and tight.