The teen accused of killing two people in a mass shooting during a 2024 Halloween block party in downtown Orlando is set to face trial this week following months of delays over whether he could claim temporary insanity.
Jaylen Edgar, who turns 19 next month, is being tried in Orange County as an adult and faces a lifelong prison sentence for first-degree murder in the killings of Tyrek Hill, 25, and Timothy Schmidt Jr., 19, as well as eight counts of attempted murder for partygoers injured by stray gunfire.
Edgar has pleaded not guilty to the charges, but he and his court-appointed attorney Junior Barrett have been at odds over Edgar’s push to base his defense on his mental state, which culminated in a July 29 letter to Circuit Judge Keith Carsten, who is presiding over the trial. In the letter, Edgar wrote he takes “full responsibility” despite the “overwhelming feelings” he claims he felt that night.
“My judgment was impaired by overwhelming feelings, and I reacted in a way that I deeply regret,” Edgar wrote. “I understand that my emotional state does not erase any responsibility for my actions. I take full responsibility for what occurred and I sincerely regret the impact my actions may have had on others.”
Jaylen Dwayne Edgar faces trial on two counts of first-degree murder with a firearm and eight counts of attempted first degree murder with a firearm. (Orlando Police Department)
Hill and Schmidt were killed in separate shootings that took place just moments apart. The first shot was fired around 1 a.m., with video surveillance on Central Boulevard and Orange Avenue capturing what looked to be Edgar shooting Hill point-blank in the face as he walked past him among the crowd.
Edgar and some companions he met up with earlier that night continued through downtown before pushing past another man and encountering one of that man’s friends in front of the Sly Fox bar on Orange Avenue near Washington Street. The ensuing altercation led to Edgar pulling out a 9mm handgun and opening fire, killing Schmidt, a UCF student uninvolved in the fray, and injuring several others as they fled the area.
Edgar was captured seconds later by patrol officers stationed on Washington Street.
“It’s a blatant execution in the middle of our streets,” then State Attorney Andrew Bain said at the time. “That’s something that we can’t have in our community.”
At the center of the criminal matter has been Edgar’s mental health. That night, he told officers he was under stress, “affected by numerous deaths of loved ones he has had to witness in his life,” and used a gun he found “early in the day at another location,” according to a report released days later.
In January, potential jurors waited downstairs of the Orange County Courthouse as tensions came to a boil between Edgar and his attorney after Edgar wrote a letter to the judge alleging Barrett refused to explore an insanity defense.
While Carsten rejected attempts by both Edgar and Barrett to grant the teen new legal counsel, he allowed further mental health evaluations that would explore Edgar’s state of mind before the shots were fired.
The results of those evaluations were kept under seal. In court on Monday, however, Barrett told the judge that the evaluations left him “still in the position where, ethically and legally, I don’t think I can go forward” with an insanity defense.
Still, Edgar’s mental state was addressed in his letter to Carsten nearly three weeks before his trial was to begin. In his time at the Orange County Jail, Edgar said he is learning to manage his emotions, was since baptized and “started to pursue a relationship with God.”
“I respectfully ask the court to consider these circumstances, along with my remorse, my effort to improve and my mental & (sic) medical records when making its decision,” the letter said.
While Barrett said he won’t present an insanity defense to jurors, Carsten said Edgar may still take the stand to testify about his mental state. It is not clear what sort of defense Barrett would present, given his client’s admissions to the judge, but he has spoken earlier this year about fingerprint analysis of the gun and the magazine.
The mass shooting on a busy Halloween night — preceded by one in 2022 that left seven people wounded — prompted city leaders to revisit restrictions on the bars and restaurants anchoring Orlando’s downtown nightlife.
The 2022 shooting led Orlando police, already a prominent presence downtown, to install security checkpoints to screen for weapons, but that effort was ultimately stymied by a change to Florida law allowing gun owners to carry without a permit.
City leaders considered having downtown businesses cover the cost of beefing up police presence while introducing a new permit for alcohol sales past 2 a.m., but neither of those ideas were ultimately adopted. Since the shooting, however, Orange Avenue has been opened up to traffic on weekend nights, a departure from the past practice closing of a portion of the strip to vehicles.
The shooting also led to an ongoing wrongful death lawsuit filed a year later by Edgar’s victims accusing the Orlando Police Department and the operators of the Wall Street Plaza entertainment complex of providing inadequate security.
