AL Deputy Killed, Firefighter Injured in Off-Duty Shooting

An off-duty Tuscaloosa County Sheriff’s Office detention deputy was killed in an overnight shooting at a south Jefferson County apartment complex that also involved an off-duty Birmingham firefighter.

The Jefferson County Coroner’s Office on Thursday identified the slain man as Juan Tierney Hall. He was 42, and a longtime sheriff’s office detention deputy in Tuscaloosa and often worked in the courthouse.

Just before 10 p.m. Wednesday, Hoover police and Jefferson County deputies were dispatched to The Lory of Hoover, formerly Emerald Pointe Apartments, off Old Rocky Ridge Road on a report of a shooting.

Hoover police found Hall and a 33-year-old Firefighter Gregory Thomas wounded.

Both men were taken to UAB Hospital where Hall was pronounced dead at 11:44 p.m. Thomas’s injuries are not believed to be life-threatening.

Sheriff’s Lt. Joni Money said Thomas heard a knock at his apartment door and went to answer. When he opened the door, Hall was standing at the door of an adjacent’ apartment – one on the first floor and one on the second - of one of the complex’s apartment buildings.

Hall opened fire, hitting Thomas. Thomas then went and retrieved a gun and returned fire.

Hall was struck in the head. He tried to run but collapsed in a grassy area nearby. Several shell casings were marked in that grassy area behind the apartment unit’s patio area.

Thomas called 911 and reported the shooting. He has been with Birmingham Fire and Rescue Service for two years.

Authorities have not released a possible motive in the deadly shooting, nor said whether the two men knew each other.

The investigation is ongoing by Jefferson County deputies.

Hall is the 186th homicide this year in all of Jefferson County.

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