Former KS deputy loses license after emptying gun at suspect

A former Smith County, Kansas, deputy had his license revoked after he used “excessive physical force” by firing a flurry of bullets at a suspect before they both got into a crash and then firing a round through the suspect’s passenger window.

That’s according to a Kansas Commission on Peace Officers’ Standards and Training revocation document released in December. The commission oversees law enforcement certifications.

“Mistakes were made on my part and I chose not to fight it,” Jeremy Presbrey said in a phone interview Dec. 16. “I can’t go back and change the past.”

Presbrey said he didn’t wish to talk in more detail about it, but that the incident, where he fired 16 shots and then one more, led to his termination. He said the suspect was not hit.

The incident happened on Jan. 13, 2024, after he stopped “a vehicle he believed was involved in a crime in a different county,” the document says. Here is what the document says happened next:

The driver initially stopped, but then began to “back away from the stop location.” Presbrey “used his duty weapon to shoot at the vehicle until he ran out of ammunition.”

A pursuit began.

Both drivers became involved in a crash, then Presbrey ordered the suspect out of the vehicle.

The suspect “did not comply,” the document says. Presbrey then shot another round through the passenger side window to try and get the suspect out of the vehicle.

Presbrey “used excessive physical force against (the suspect) while carrying out a law enforcement objective,” the document says.

Presbrey worked for the Smith County Sheriff’s Office from July 2018 to April 2024, the document says.