ORLANDO, Fla. — State Attorney Andrew Bain announced Monday morning that 17-year-old Jaylen Dwayne Edgar will be charged as an adult in connection with the Nov. 1 shooting in downtown Orlando that left two people dead and eight others injured.

What You Need To Know

  • Jaylen Dwayne Edgar, 17, has been charged with two counts of first-degree murder and six counts of attempted first-degree murder after an early morning mass shooting in downtown Orlando on Nov. 1

  • On Monday, State Attorney Andrew Bain announced that Edgar would be charged as an adult in the case

  • He said that the brazen nature of the shooting played a part in the decision to upgrade that charges against Edgar

Edgar was formally charged Monday with two counts of second-degree murder and a count of attempted murder with a firearm. 

Florida law requires all first-degree murder indictments to come from a grand jury, and Bain said his office will be presenting their case to the grand jury "in the near future."

"This decision was not made lightly — and only after reviewing all the available evidence," Bain said during a Monday press conference. "This decision is based on several aggravating factors, including the brazen nature of the crime, and the multiple victims who were shot in the middle of the street in downtown who were out simply celebrating Halloween."

Edgar is has been accused of opening fire just after 1 a.m. on Nov. 1 while an estimated 75,000 people were in downtown Orlando for Halloween celebrations. Tyrek Hill, 25, and 19-year-old University of Central Florida student Timothy Schmidt Jr. were killed in the shooting.

In response to the shooting, Orlando Mayor Buddy Dyer declared a local state of emergency for seven days that will end alcohol sales at midnight and place a curfew inside the Downtown Entertainment District from 1 a.m. to 5 a.m. The local state of emergency is expected to end on Friday, Nov. 8. 

Bain said that evidence in the case was overwhelming and left him no choice but to upgrade Edgar's charges.

"I personally reviewed and looked at all the records and videos in this case and there's no question that this individual should be charged as an adult," he said.

Noting the large number of people in downtown at the time of the shooting, Bain said many more people could have been injured in the chaos that followed.

"That's 75,000 people running for their lives that night," he said. "To shoot into a massive crowd like that, shows a true disregard for life, and the only recourse is to charge this defendant as an adult, because it fits the egregious nature of the crime."

Bain said Edgar's criminal history consists of an active, unrelated charge of grand theft of a motor vehicle, which will be impacted by the decision to charge him as an adult in the shooting case.

"By law, since that charge is still open, that case also will now be filed in adult circuit court," he said.

Bain went on to say that the Nov. 1 mass shooting case was indicative of a larger issue in Orlando: "Keeping guns, the access to them, out of the hands of people who shouldn't have them, especially our youth."

"We can pass all the laws we want ... and it could do some good, but it's up to the people of this community to report it to law enforcement when they know that someone has a gun when they shouldn't," he said.

In Florida, House Bill 543, which was passed in 2023, made it legal for most adults to carry concealed weapons without a permit, which officials say has complicated security for events like the Halloween celebration in Orlando. Despite that, Bain said it is still against Florida law for anyone younger than 21 to carry a concealed handgun.

"Even though many in law enforcement, like myself, disagree with the change in (Florida's) concealed weapons law, it is still illegal for a 17-year-old to possess a handgun," Bain said.

"In our community, we need to end the cone of silence that protects those who pose a threat," Bain added, noting that law enforcement and the public need to work together to keep shootings like this from happening in the future.

"This is not just a law enforcement issue," he said. "This is a community effort, and we must work together to make our neighborhoods safer."

Bain went on to say that there was no guarantee that if someone had reported that someone had a gun in the crowd that it would have prevented what happened. But if law enforcement had that information, it could have made a difference, he said.

"I don't know if the outcome would be different if somebody had reported the defendant had a gun and that report actually made it to law enforcement," he said. "But, if they did have that information and they did have that report to them, there is always the chance that this mass shooting could have been prevented."