Deputies’ fatal shooting of fugitive in Antioch ruled justified

McHenry County and Lake County sheriff’s deputies used justifiable force when they shot and killed a fugitive in the parking lot of an Antioch pizzeria in April, the Lake County state’s attorney’s office has found.

Gerald R. Boyes, 53, was in a vehicle that had been stolen in Florida and was being sought as a “person of interest” in the murders of his father and another person in Kentucky’s McCracken County when two sheriff’s deputies from each county cornered him in a parking lot outside Topper’s at 26211 W. Route 173, according to prosecutors.

They said that when the officers identified themselves and tried to arrest Boyes, he reached for a gun and was shot when he wouldn’t drop it.

A Ruger Redhawk .44-caliber revolver was found in Boyes’ hand, and two .380-caliber handguns were found within his reach, prosecutors said.

In 1984, Boyes was sentenced to more than 60 years for armed robbery and grand theft in Broward County, Florida, and in 1989 he escaped from a prison in Orange County, according to the Florida Department of Corrections. He got parole in October 2013 but was again listed as a fugitive earlier this year, records show.