Shot 4 Times, Lee's Summit Missouri Police Officer Talks about Surviving Violent Clash

In the minutes after he was shot four times, Lee’s Summit Officer Jared Timbrook remembers he wanted to talk. Not just lie there, but keep saying something.

It’s like a “survival tactic,” Timbrook, 39, said. And on June 2, when he was shot during a domestic violence call, he leaned on that.

“Kind of reassuring myself that I, you know, don’t know how well I am, but I’m talking,” Timbrook said Tuesday morning, as he spoke to the media for the first time since the shooting. “I’m still talking, I’m still coherent, I’m still able to give information.

“It’s just something that’s kind of taught to us in training. Do what you can to make sure you stay conscious. Do what you can to survive.”

Timbrook — who was shot in the left leg, left arm, the chest of his body armor and the shoulder — spent 6 to 8 weeks recovering at home. He came back last month to light duty. And as he continues to heal and get back to full strength, he’s working in the detective unit helping with cases.

“They expect (Timbrook) to make a full return to the road,” said Sgt. Chris Depue with the Lee’s Summit Police Department.

That alone is amazing, said Timbrook, Depue and a representative for the soft body armor vest that stopped a bullet from piercing the officer’s chest.

“He was shot (in the) upper chest, straight through his badge, actually,” said Ryan Nelson, of Point Blank, the company that makes the vest Timbrook was wearing that day. “With that there’s very little actual ballistic material. ... So anytime there’s edge shots, it really is amazing that it stops. Now, our armor does it all the time, but it really does defy physics.”

When asked if Timbrook “got a little lucky” that day, Nelson said: “Absolutely, the Lord has more plans for him.”

Depue didn’t know Timbrook very well before the shooting. The officer, who worked at two other police agencies, had only been with the Lee’s Summit department for a little more than a year when the incident occurred.

But after watching the footage from those moments after the shooting, when Timbrook tried to stay talking, Depue said he “gained an immense respect for his character and fortitude.”.

“There’s no screaming, there’s no, ‘Help me!’” Depue said. “This guy’s as cool as a cucumber, directing other officers as to where the suspect is. He’s talking about like I am right now.

“I’m sure the dispatchers are going, ‘I’m not sure he’s even been hurt.’ That’s where you see his character. It’s ‘Hey, I know I’ve been shot, I know I’m wounded.’ Probably didn’t know how badly at that time, but he knew that he needed help.”

Timbrook also knew, Depue said, that “anything he did on the radio brings more resources, more help, and keeps his other officers safe.”

“What he did in those 15 seconds after he got a shot defines him as a person.”

At the hospital, soon after the shooting, Timbrook said he was cracking jokes with his fellow officers. As he said: “I had to, there was no way around it.”

Until he saw his wife, Tiffani.

“When she got there, everybody emptied,” Timbrook said. “She came to me, hugged me, and we just cried for several minutes.”

Rise in domestic violence

Lee’s Summit Police responded to the Residences of Echelon Apartments after a woman reported a domestic disturbance, court records show. She alleges that during an argument with Thomas Eugene Tolbert of Kansas City, he became violent, throwing her to the ground and kicking her.

She then grabbed her child and fled downstairs before calling the police. The first officer to arrive at the scene, Timbrook, located Tolbert in the complex’s parking lot. When he tried to obtain Tolbert’s information, Tolbert refused.

When Timbrook attempted to detain Tolbert, the suspect allegedly broke free and ran through the parking lot. As Tolbert rounded garage buildings, he allegedly fired four shots, striking Timbrook, records show.

The June shooting was just one more example of the significant increase in crimes related to domestic violence, including homicides, in the Kansas City area.

So far, there have been 18 domestic violence homicides in Kansas City this year. In all of 2024 there were 12 in KC, according to information from Kansas City police. Other municipalities, across state lines, have also seen serious crimes related to domestic violence so far this year.

“They’re one of the most dangerous calls we can do,” Timbrook said. “Traffic stops and domestic violence calls. … We’re going into highly escalated scenes where people’s tempers are flaring and we’re doing our best to de-escalate.

“We just take it call to call and try to do our best to make sure that we go home safe, that everybody else goes home safe. And we do the best we can for the best outcome.”

In late July, roughly eight weeks after Timbrook was shot, a Wyandotte County deputy responding to another domestic call was shot and killed. A woman called requesting that police accompany her as she moved out of a residence, due to concerns about her safety, authorities said. She reported that when friends tried to help her, a male subject threatened them with a firearm.

Dep. Elijah Ming, 34, and an officer with the Kansas City, Kansas, Police Department, approached the front door, and a man inside the home allegedly fired at the two. Rounds struck Ming and he was later pronounced dead at a local hospital.

The Wyandotte County District Attorney’s Office charged Shawn Harris, 38, with capital murder and criminal possession of a weapon in the killing. Prosecutors plan to pursue the death penalty if Harris is convicted.

Timbrook said the Ming shooting “hit home” and shook him and his wife, who were at a Darius Rucker concert that day. The situation was similar, both domestic violence calls. The next day they woke up to the news that Ming had died.

“That was kind of rough,” Timbrook said.

‘I’m not a hero in my mind’

As Timbrook was in rehab, he’d try to go into the office every once in a while to do his paperwork. Just to be there and see people.

“I’d make an intention of trying to walk around a little bit,” he said. “Or have people come to me so they could lay eyes on me, so the people that hadn’t talked to me in a little bit or hadn’t truly seen me, (could) truly be able to lay eyes on me and go, ‘He’s okay.’”

On Tuesday, the officer used a cane to help him get around.

The injury to his thigh “has definitely been the worst,” he said. “It’s nerve pain. There’s deformity in my thigh right now. ... Movement in my foot is getting better. That was also kind of rough. There’s still quite a bit of numbness in my foot and my thigh as well. “

He working to build back his strength.

During his time at home, Timbrook thought about the job. And what it meant to him.

“I’m not a hero in my mind,” Timbrook said. “I’m a guy doing his job that he loves.

“I got into this when I was 30. So I got into it later in life. But I’m just not the same person when I’m not doing this job. Mentally. I’m still a nice person, I still try to do what I can. But I just feel better about myself when I’m working.”

Immediately after he was shot, Timbrook said he thought about his wife, his family and his niece and nephew.

“When I saw them a few weeks back, I pretty much balled,” the officer said of his niece and nephew. “You know, just running up to me saying, ‘Uncle Jared, Uncle Jared!’ It was just like, I wasn’t ready for it. But it is something that I’m glad I got to hear.”

No doubt the shooting has changed him. Not only his outlook, but his intentions with those around him.

“It’s (about) being a better friend, a better uncle, a better son to my mother,” Timbrook said. He tries to do more with people.

Talk turned to his wife.

“I don’t know where I’d be without her,” he said. “There was times that she was bathing me because I couldn’t. Couldn’t really stand … I sat down and couldn’t really get back up.

“She’s always there, she always worried. Still constantly worried.”

The two have been in it together, he said, and will continue to be.

“... I’ve got to be strong for her, so she can be strong for me,” he said. Then he lightened the mood a bit.

“Future wise, it’s just knowing I can’t get shot again, because she doesn’t want that to happen again.”

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