When law enforcement officers from three different Jeff Davis County agencies attempted to arrest Dalton Sears, 30, of Hazlehurst, at a Hazlehurst Dollar General store on a probation violation on August 7, 2025, Sears allegedly told the officers – a trooper from the Georgia State Patrol, deputies from the Jeff Davis County Sheriff’s Office, and officers from the Hazlehurst Police Department – that he wasn’t going to jail. According to incident reports obtained via open records requests, Sears stated that he was going to commit suicide by cutting his throat or he would die via suicide by cop. Sears was in the backseat of a black Toyota 4Runner with a large knife to his throat when he made those statements, according to the reports.
The incident ended over an hour later with Sears plunging the knife into his neck after Jeff Davis County Sheriff Preston Bohannon ordered his deputies to end the standoff immediately – even though Sears had agreed to end the incident peacefully by handing the knife over to state trooper Daniel Ivey and had started to give him the knife. The reports show that deputies rushed in and deployed their tasers. When Sears saw what they were going to do, the reports say that he started stabbing himself in the neck. The deputies attempted to tase Sears but they missed, hitting both Trooper Ivey and a police officer.
Sears suffered injuries to his neck and was transported to the Jeff Davis Hospital via EMS. He remained in the hospital for several days. Upon his release, he was booked into the Jeff Davis County Jail.
DouglasNow also requested video footage from the agencies. The Georgia Department of Public Safety gave DouglasNow dashcam footage from Trooper Ivey’s patrol car. The Hazlehurst Police Department submitted bodycam footage from its officers who were at the scene. The Jeff Davis County Sheriff’s Office does not utilize body cameras so no footage was available from that agency. The video that accompanies the story is a portion of footage from a Hazlehurst police officer. All the videos have been posted on the DouglasNow.com YouTube channel and can be seen there in their entirety.
According to the reports the Jeff Davis County Sheriff’s Office provided to DouglasNow, Deputy Chace McLendon received a call from JDSO Investigator Brad Wooten regarding Sears. Wooten told McLendon that Sears had left a court ordered drug treatment facility and had allegedly made threats to take his own life earlier in the day. Wooten told McLendon that Sears was headed to a West Coffee Street location in a black SUV, which turned out to be a Toyota 4Runner. Sears was also likely in possession of a knife, Wooten said, according to the report.
Eventually, Hazlehurst police officers Branon Wyatt and Sylvester Brown responded, along with deputy Collin Reagin and state trooper Daniel Ivey.
McLendon located Sears in the 4Runner at the Dollar General on West Coffee Street. He was in the back seat of the vehicle but there was a child who was also in the 4Runner in a car seat. McLendon’s report says that when Sears saw the officers, he picked up a knife and placed it to his neck. Officers were able to get the child out of the 4Runner without incident. EMS responded to the scene but parked nearby out of harm’s way.
The officers negotiated with Sears in an effort to get him to put down the knife. Swinson’s report says that Sears stated, “Y’all don’t understand what’s going to happen. Either I’m fixing to start cutting or y’all are going to have to shoot me because I’m not going back to jail.” After this exchange, the report says that Hazlehurst PD Captain David Moore and Trooper Ivey arrived at the scene. Sears appeared to be intoxicated and was drinking beer during the incident, the report says.
Swinson’s report states that Sheriff Bohannon called him and asked for an update on the situation. He told the sheriff that they were attempting to de-escalate the situation. The report says that Sheriff Bohannon told the deputy “to remove Sears from the vehicle however possible and put him into custody.” Swinson’s report acknowledges that around that time, Trooper Ivey seemed to be getting through to Sears; Sears told Ivey that if the other officers stepped away, he would put the knife down.
Trooper Ivey’s report says that Deputy Reagin told him to watch out and showed him his taser. Reagin added that Sheriff Bohannon had “advised them to do what they had to do to get him out of the vehicle.” Ivey’s report then says that Ivey told Reagin that he wouldn’t be able to tase him fast enough to keep Sears from cutting his throat.
In dashcam footage from Trooper Ivey’s patrol car, all officers except for Ivey walk away from the 4Runner. Ivey is by himself talking to Sears. “You hand me the knife and EMS is coming over here. More than likely, EMS is going to want to carry you to the hospital to get you checked out. You’ll have to tell the doctors the same thing that they’re going to ask. You’re going to the hospital to get checked out. You’re not going to jail,” Ivey says to Sears.
Ivey’s report says that he asked Sears to take the knife by the blade and hand it to him handle first. Ivey would then take the knife and EMS would come over. The report says that Sears grabbed the knife by the blade but before he could hand it to Ivey, the deputies, upon orders from Sheriff Bohannon, returned.
Officer Wyatt’s report says that while Ivey was talking to Sears, Swinson stated, “I’m going to do what the sheriff wants.” Captain Moore wrote in his report that he placed a call to police chief James Mock: “He advised me to let the deputies handle it and we would just assist.”
The other officers walked back to the 4Runner. When Sears saw the officers return, he made good on his statements to hurt himself. Sears then put the knife back to his throat. Deputies opened the door to tase Sears, the report says, and Sears started cutting his throat. The deputies attempted to tase Sears but missed. Ivey tried to grab Sears’s hand that was holding the knife and ended up getting tased as well. Ivey’s report says that Sears “turned the knife upright and started sticking it through his neck and started hitting the handle with his other hand, trying to hammer it farther in.” In bodycam footage from the Hazlehurst Police Department, Sears can be seen hitting the knife with his hand exactly in this manner.
About that time, Sheriff Bohannon arrived on the scene. Once the tasers stopped cycling, according to Ivey’s report, Sheriff Bohannon grabbed Sears by the legs and pulled him out of the vehicle. When Sears was on the ground, blood was visible on his neck. EMS immediately pulled up and transported him for treatment.
After Sears was out of the vehicle, Ivey’s report says that Sheriff Bohannon began yelling at the deputies, stating that Sears had been in charge of the incident. “He’s the damn one that’s got the damn warrant on him. It doesn’t work that way. It’s either we are in charge or the damn criminal is in charge,” said Sheriff Bohannon.
Swinson’s account of the incident states that after Sheriff Bohannon told them to get Sears out of the vehicle a second time, he told Reagin to use less-than-lethal force (taser) and he “would hold lethal force in the event that less-lethal force was unsuccessful.” The report says that they opened the doors to the 4Runner and then Sears started cutting his neck. Reagin tased Sears but the taser didn’t make good contact. He deployed a second cartridge that was also ineffective. At that point, Swinson holstered his service weapon and deployed his taser on Sears, which again did not have the desired effect. While this was happening, Sears was continuing to cut himself with the knife. Swinson also says that while officers were trying to grab the knife from Sears, he would swing the knife in their direction. It was then that Sheriff Bohannon arrived and pulled Sears out of the vehicle.
Reagin’s report says that while Sears was being tased, he “continued trying to jab his throat and was swinging the knife toward city officers when they tried grabbing the knife. At that time, Sheriff Bohannon showed up and helped us drag him by his feet out of the SUV and we were able to get the knife out of his hand.”
Sears was transported to the Jeff Davis Hospital for treatment. After he was released, he was booked into the Jeff Davis County Jail. DouglasNow asked the JDSO for Sears’s booking photo via open records request but did not receive it. DouglasNow also talked to Sheriff Bohannon last week. The sheriff did not make an official statement, saying only that the standoff was taking place in the parking lot of a business and he wanted his deputies to end it quickly.
Bodycam footage from the two Hazlehurst police officers and dashcam footage from the Georgia State Patrol can be seen in their entirety by clicking on the links below.
Hazlehurst Police Department Bodycam #1 From Dalton Sears Incident • August 7, 2025
Hazlehurst Police Department Bodycam #2 From Dalton Sears Incident • August 7, 2025
Dashcam Footage from GSP Trooper During Dalton Sears Incident • August 7, 2025