JACKSONVILLE, Fla. – Three gunshots in about two seconds changed everything for a Jacksonville police officer earlier this year.
For the first time since being injured in the line of duty nearly nine months ago, Officer Malik Daricaud shared his battle to get back on his feet and back on duty.
The 26-year-old father, husband, Navy veteran, Florida Air National Guard staff sergeant, and two-year veteran patrolman with the Jacksonville Sheriff’s Office is still in intensive physical therapy.
In an interview only with News4JAX, Malik recounted the night of March 26 -- when he was nearly killed in the line of duty.
“I couldn’t move at all,” he recalled. “I can hear my partners that were there with me. I can hear someone yell, ‘Where’s Malik?!’”
Jacksonville Sheriff T.K. Waters said Malik and other officers went to a Westside home on Ridgeview Avenue near Morse Avenue to conduct a door knock to follow up on a traffic incident from a week earlier involving 32-year-old Tyliko Maduro. Maduro had four previous arrests involving drugs and violation of community control, according to Duval County jail records.
When no one responded to the door knock, Waters said, officers contacted Maduro’s mother -- who went to the home and agreed to open the door and bring her son out.
Daricuad’s body cam shows Maduro popping into view with an SKS rifle.
“I make eye contact with him for a glimpse, a moment,” Malik recalled. “I illuminate my flashlight. And I can see that he steps out from a back bedroom. And then that’s when I see a bright burst of like light. And I immediately just hit the floor, and all I can see is the sky at that point.”
Maduro fired several shots past his own mother. One of the bullets hit the flashlight Malik was holding in his hand, and shrapnel ricocheted into his neck and shoulders, causing severe damage to his spinal cord.
With Malik bleeding from the neck and unable to move, fellow officers pulled him out of the line of fire.
RELATED: 3 awarded Medals of Valor for actions after fellow JSO officer shot in March
In radio dispatch recordings (press play below to listen), one officer can be heard calling for all available officers across the city to respond, warning his colleagues to come rifles out. Police did not return fire at Maduro.
The sheriff said Maduro took his own life -- and Malik was in the fight for his.
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Malik said the only thing on his mind in those moments was his family.
“My wife, my son, being there for my family,” he said. “If this was my last moments now, I just wanted to tell my family that I love them.”
Malik has fought hard in the hospital, which included serious setbacks due to pain and infection. Despite it all, he’s getting stronger each day with the help of his wife, Jasmine, and his 5-year-old son, Malachi.
“[Malachi’s] there almost every day, and he’s just, he’s my sunshine. Like when I see him, this smile lights me up. And he just keeps me going,” Malik said.
The injured officer says he’s had to relearn essentially everything -- from learning to use the right side of his body again to standing and walking. He’s doing it with the help of a talented team at Brooks Rehabilitation.
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Physical therapist Sydney Dalton and Dr. Howard Weiss, Brooks’ Medical Director of the Orthopedic/Trauma Program, are with Malik every step of the way.
They said their goal is for him “to walk out” of the facility.
“This is a strong American veteran police officer that wants to recover,” Weiss said. “And every day, every week, I’m thinking of something new for him. Another thing that we could try, and we’ve tried lots of things, and we keep doing it. His occupational therapists, his physical therapist, they put it to him, and he’s come back pushing.”
Dalton said the two have formed a friendship with Malik.
“I get to bug him all the time too,” Dalton said.
They believe Malik has what it takes to defy the odds and walk on his own once again.
“I’m going to push him either way,” Dalton said. “So as soon as I come in -- and he may not want to see me -- but I’m going to keep pushing him, pushing him hard.”
Weiss said he’s been working with spinal cord injuries for three decades, and while only a handful of people walk again, he’s optimistic Malik will defy the odds because he’s a young man who doesn’t give up.
It’s motivation for Malik to keep pushing so he can get back to playing basketball with his son -- without his wheelchair -- back to driving, and one day, back to work with JSO.
“I’m staying in the fight, trying to get back to what I was doing before,” Malik said, adding that if he’s given the chance, he will “absolutely” go back to patrolling Jacksonville’s streets.
Despite being in the line of fire more than once.
Months before the March 26 shooting, Malik responded to a call with his partner when a gunman fired at them. A bullet hit his partner in the chest, but the officer’s ballistics vest prevented serious injuries. The suspect ran off and jumped to his death off the Dames Point Bridge.
Even with the dangers of the job, being a police officer was Malik’s childhood dream.
“It’s just something that I always wanted to do. From the age of 12, I was infatuated with law enforcement,” Malik said.
He remembers his first experience as a police explorer in North Miami Beach, which led to a tour in the Navy that brought him to Jacksonville.
In the River City, he signed up to serve on two different fronts: He joined the Florida Air National Guard and the police academy at Florida State College at Jacksonville, which led to an emotional moment for Malik when his mentor pinned his badge at graduation.
Malik said he finds satisfaction in the service aspects of policing.
“It’s just protecting the community, protecting those that can’t protect themselves and serving,” he said.
Malik is also one of a select squad of officers at JSO on the unmanned aircraft “UAS” team. He hopes to get back to using drones to help protect our community, and he has the full support of his brothers and sisters in blue, who are eagerly awaiting his return to duty.
RELATED: Community raises money to support recovering JSO officer who was critically wounded in shooting
Malik said he is appreciative of the support he and his family have received from the community and everyone who has been there for them over the last nine months. His family has a lot to be excited about, too. His son is in school, and he and his wife just bought a home in Jacksonville.
And Malik is inviting everyone to see him rise back up as he one day walks out of Brooks Rehabilitation on his own two feet.
If you’d like to show your support for Malik, you can send him a card and cheer him on. Mail it to:
Jacksonville Sheriff’s Office
Attention: Ofc. Malik Daricaud
501 E. Bay St.
Jacksonville, FL 32202