Three Fort Lauderdale police officers investigating a possible homicide exchanged gunfire with the suspect in a hotel room near Port Everglades on Thursday.
When it was over, one officer was wounded by gunfire, the suspect was dead and there was no sign of the homicide that drew police to the Holiday Inn Express Fort Lauderdale Cruise Airport in the first place.
Fort Lauderdale Police identified the man who died Thursday as Karl Chludinsky, 46, of Margate. Chludinsky had a history of mental health issues and was required to forfeit his guns and ammunition to Margate Police for a year in January 2022 after he threatened to kill himself, court records show.
He posed “a significant danger” of hurting himself or others by possessing guns or ammunition, according to a petition for a protection order filed by Margate Police in January 2022. The petition said at the time Chludinsky may be mentally ill or suffer from recurring mental health issues.
The investigation halted traffic east of U.S. 1 on Southeast 17th Street to the causeway bridge for most of Thursday morning. The north entrance to Port Everglades was sealed off for most of that time, but with two other entrances and only one cruise ship, port activity was largely unaffected. There also appeared to be minimal impact on a Call of Duty tournament taking place at the Broward Convention Center, which drew competitors from across the country, some of whom were staying at the Holiday Inn Express.
Fort Lauderdale Police Chief Bill Schultz provided few details about the fatal encounter at a news conference late Thursday morning. He said the suspect called police at 7:39 a.m. to report that he had killed someone in his room, but he did not cooperate when police arrived to question him.
After the shooting, the suspect barricaded himself in the room and the officers withdrew, Schultz said. A SWAT team re-entered the room and found the suspect alone and dead.
The wounded officer was taken to Broward Health Medical Center for treatment of an injury that was not considered life-threatening. Casey Liening, a spokesperson for the police department, said about 5 p.m. that the officer had been released from the hospital and is expected to recover.
The Florida Department of Law Enforcement will handle the investigation, which is standard for police-involved shootings. The three officers who fired their weapons will be placed on administrative leave, which also is standard procedure.
The police department had not identified the three officers as of Thursday evening.
Mental health history
Chludinsky had been committed to a hospital under the Baker Act in January 2022, according to court records.
A licensed mental health professional assessed Chludinsky after an incident at his home where his girlfriend and mother said he was acting erratically and was suffering an apparent mental breakdown. His girlfriend and mother said Chludinsky put a gun in his mouth and threatened to kill himself, but they were able to convince him to get help, according to the risk protection order petition. They drove Chludinsky to a location that is redacted in the petition.
The mental health professional notified Margate Police about him possibly being dangerous, according to the petition.
“Karl’s mother and girlfriend were concerned for the safety of Karl and the community,” the petition said.
Chludinsky was diagnosed by the professional, but the diagnosis is redacted in the petition. He was transferred to Florida Medical Center by the Broward Sheriff’s Office.
Chludinsky’s mother told a detective he had been suffering from a condition that is redacted in the petition for a few years after a divorce. The police department sought the protection order after the incident, and he agreed to forfeit his two handguns, one shotgun and ammunition for a year, court records show.
The last court filing in the case from December 2022 said Chludinsky was being treated at a mental health facility in Sunrise, and he did not have any criminal charges against him in the year since the protection order was issued. There were also no calls for service to his address or new cases.
A Margate Police detective wrote in the December 2022 court document that Chludinsky “has good judgment, is making good progress and has the capacity to make independent legal, medical and financial decisions. Karl would like to have his firearms returned.”
Lt. Michael Druzbik, a spokesperson for Margate Police, said in an email Thursday that the protection order expired in April 2023, and the case was closed.
“In accordance with our policies, the subject was allowed and did in fact take back into his custody his firearms and ammunition,” Druzbik said. “We have not had any further contact with the subject related to any other (risk protection orders).”
Between 2004 and 2020, Chludinsky was the subject of six domestic violence cases in Broward County.
A woman he was previously married to filed two of the cases against him. In a petition in June 2019, the woman, who was still his wife at the time and who has a child with him, indicated in her petition that he had been the subject of a Baker Act proceeding previously and wrote that he had “an extremely traumatic and violent past.”
The woman wrote that Chludinsky got involved with a church and had been sober for 10 years after using drugs for most of his life, according to the petition.
“When I met him, he was on staff at our church and living a completely restored life sober,” the woman wrote, but issues later followed in their marriage and they divorced in 2020, according to court records.
She wrote in the petition that Chludinsky’s best friend died from an overdose in 2018 and his well-being declined after, and she suspected he was again drinking alcohol and using drugs.
Court records show he was arrested in September 2019 for possession of methamphetamine and driving under the influence. He was sentenced to probation, which ended in February 2021.
Guests describe chaos
Immediately after the gunfire, guests at the hotel described the chaos.
“We’re moving down here. We were waking up to have breakfast at the hotel, and staff pushed everyone into an event room,” said hotel guest Alexis Boettcher, of Cleveland Ohio. “I came downstairs. They told me there was an active shooter and I couldn’t go back in the building.”
Bullet holes could be seen clearly in some windows above the pool deck.
Boettcher and her boyfriend, Luis Castanedo, had noticed streams of police cars arriving when they got up Thursday morning. He went down to get breakfast while she went outside to see what was going on. Then Castanedo heard a gunshot and the couple was separated.
Castanedo was put into a conference room with about 15 other hotel guests, including families with children, he said, the lights shut off. Hotel staff told them there was an active shooter. Quietly, they went on their phones to try to find out what was going on.
The two finally reunited outside the hotel later Thursday morning.
Castanedo said hotel staff seemed to know what they were doing, and it was clearly a drill they had practiced before.
Alejandro Morales, 23, had just arrived in Fort Lauderdale from New Orleans Thursday morning for the Call of Duty tournament, which would get underway at 12:30 p.m., when his Uber got stuck and he saw the caution tape and dozens of police cars out front.
“I was going to leave my bag and go to the event but I don’t think that’s going to happen,” Morales said.
Six Spring Breakers visiting from Boston said they were two doors down from the room where the situation unfolded.
Luke Loffler was still in his swim trunks and towel as he stood in the parking lot across the street. He said he had gone down to use the hotel pool and was in the elevator when the doors opened on six police officers with guns telling him to get downstairs.
His friends, meanwhile, were back in the room, where Bryce Winter and Nick Morrissey said they heard somewhere around 15 shots.
Pro-Call of Duty players continued to arrive as the morning went on, unsure what to do. Some had traveled from as far as London for the event and are professional players with large followings online.
Two players, Sam Zanchelli and Austin Kalchbrenner, had arrived at the hotel Wednesday night from New York and Panama City, respectively, said they were awakened by gunfire near their room on the sixth floor. Police officers then knocked on the door, told them to grab whatever they had and escorted them outside of the hotel, where they gave witness statements.
Sun Sentinel photojournalist Joe Cavaretta contributed to this report.
