Man killed by Charlotte Co. deputies had...

PUNTA GORDA, Fla. — Less than 24 hours after the deadly shooting of a man in Charlotte County, killed by deputies, we're learning more about him.

His name is Michael Lewis Schwartz, a 53-year-old man with a history of mental illness.

Fox 4 Senior Reporter Kaitlin Knapp obtained court documents showing the history:

In December 2021, Plantation Police responded to a call about someone with a gun. That person, police say, was Schwartz. A police report obtained by Fox 4 says he went to someone's door and accused them of working with his ex-girlfriend to hack into his credit card account and stealing information.

Police say Schwartz pulled a gun out and pressed it against the victim's forehead for two minutes as he said "fix the issues." The report says the victim only said he would because he was in fear for his life.

Officers tried to contact Schwartz, but he wouldn't come out of his home. The SWAT team arrived and he eventually came out and was arrested.

Prosecutors charged him aggravated battery and aggravated assault with a deadly weapon.

Schwartz's attorney asked for a mental health evaluation because there were serious mental health concerns, the documents said. It also stated that family members explained that Schwartz has a long history of mental illness.

The documents say in January 2022 he was sent to a mental health facility for evaluation and potential Baker Act proceedings. However, it's not clear if he was Baker Acted.

Schwartz was found competent and got out on bond, but had to wear an electronic device. They allowed him to stay in Charlotte County with family for mental health treatment.

In August 2022, he was plead no contest to aggravated assault, a second-degree felony.

Schwartz was sentenced to 3 years probation, but a condition was that he had to "continue with ongoing mental health treatment and medications" in Charlotte County. It's not clear what he was being treated for. However, his attorney said he suffered from delusions.

Ordered by the court, he was not allowed to have weapons, firearms or ammo while on probation. He also had to turn over the gun used in the crime.

Fox 4 also discovered the City of Plantation filed a risk protection order against Schwartz the day after he was arrested for the crime in 2021. Law enforcement experts say this is a safeguard to ensure someone who may be at risk of harming others or themselves cannot get access to a weapon.

In April 2024, a request was granted to end the probation early rather than in 2025. Nine months later, the shooting happened.

It's not clear how he got the gun.

University of Central Florida professor Jacinta Gau says keeping guns away from certain people is an impossible task.

"There's just so many firearms in society. It is just impossible to create a class of people who can't have them, whether that's in, you know, domestic violence cases, whether that's in mental health cases," she explained.

Because it was a second-degree felony, Florida law prohibits him from having a gun.

"He had a violent crime with a deadly weapon in the past. So he's got a history of assaulting people with a deadly weapon, and then combine that with mental, you know, mental health diagnosis," Gau said.

To bring some perspective about law enforcement's mental health training, Knapp spoke with Lt. Steven Bennett with George Mason University Police. He's a regional crisis intervention teacher.

"I'm not certain that there could have been anything that was done differently to address it because of the immediacy of the safety component to the officers, other people in the area, especially being outside, or something along those lines," he said.

Bennett says there's a national program for crisis intervention training. It's a combination of skills taught with mental health professionals, too.

"Part of crisis intervention training is a lot of de-escalation and a lot of effective communication and identifying concerns or behaviors or things that that individual is experiencing to try and relate to them and effectively get them to a state where they're able to articulately speak with you," he explained. "

It's important to note that it's not clear if deputies knew Schwartz had mental health issues, or if they even knew who Schwartz was before they fired shots.

"Assuming we have that information ahead of time. It's something that officers would typically try and, you know, read any information that we have available past encounters, anything of that nature," Bennett said. "If it's something that we can look at address and we know that there are things that are positive feedback and negative feedback with that individual, specific to their mental health, the officers will make every reasonable accommodation within the safety components of everybody involved to make sure that that individual is addressed in the safest, most comfortable way possible for that individual."

Charlotte County Sheriff Bill Prummell has been a big proponent for addressing mental health concerns in the community, and has even presented legislation to combat it.

The department also has a Crisis Intervention Unit called IRIS.

CCSO is expected to release more information early next week.