Wounded Gadsden County sheriff's deputy released from hospital, parade escorts her home

Law enforcement officers and emergency response personnel from multiple local and state agencies stood at attention outside the doors of Tallahassee Memorial Healthcare's M.T. Mustian Center Sunday afternoon.

They waited nearly two hours to greet their comrade – Gadsden County Sheriff's Deputy Chicara Hearns – as she was released from the hospital with a bullet from a "career criminal" still stuck inside her after her five-day stay.

Hearns had tears in her eyes as her wheelchair was pushed over the hospital's threshold and she saw the line of her colleagues there to support her and she got into her mother's car under her own power.

As she left the hospital, Lt. Anglie Holmes, a spokeswoman for the Gadsden County Sheriff’s Office live-streamed on Facebook, with the video garnering 26,000 viewers from all across the country.

Back story:

• 'A hero': Gadsden County deputy shot by 'career criminal' recovering after confrontation

• Gadsden Sheriff's Office: Man fired multiple shots at deputy after ramming her patrol car

She and her mother were escorted from the hospital back to her home in Havana by over a dozen law enforcement and emergency vehicles.

She was shot on the job last week along a secluded stretch of Jamieson Road in Northern Gadsden County.

Hearns came upon a stolen truck she and other officers were trying to find. Police say the man behind the wheel was Dexter Lawson, a 38-year-old felon from Quincy.

“She noticed him,” said Lt. Anglie Holmes, a spokeswoman for the Gadsden County Sheriff’s Office. “He was heading in her direction and just rammed her head-on and pinned her in a ditch. (He) got out and opened fire on her.”

Lawson fired three rounds, with two stopped by Hearns' bulletproof vest and another striking her, Sheriff Morris Young said in a news conference Wednesday. It missed all of her major organs but remains inside her, Young said. Doctors hope to remove it later.

"She's doing very well," Holmes said Sunday. "She stopped taking her pain meds on Friday morning – she said she didn't want them anymore. And then she started her therapy and moved out of the intensive care unit yesterday and into a regular room."

Holmes said Hearns will continue physical therapy and it will be a while before she's ready to return to work.

"She's doing good," she said. "Amazingly good."

Earlier in the week, Robert and Melody Rodriguez, the couple who helped Hearns after she crawled out of her squad car wounded, was recognized by Young.

"Sheriff Young called the Rodriguez’ Angels and Heroes who did what he felt many citizens would have done," the sheriff's office said in an email. "The Rodriguez’ shared that they had given Deputy Hearns an Angel figurine months ago after she helped their daughter through a rough time and believe that the Angel protected her as the incident unfolded right in front of their home."

Contact Tori Lynn Schneider at tschneider@tallahassee.com or on Twitter @photoriphy. Check out her photos on Instagram @phototori_.

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This article originally appeared on Tallahassee Democrat: Gadsden County sheriff's deputy Chicara Hearns released from hospital