teen shoots intruder after father says on phone, `Do what you have to do’
Date: May 26, 2006 7:25 PM
http://www.sun-sentinel.com/news/local/broward/sfl-skidshoot25may25%2C0%
Hollywood teen shoots intruder after father says on phone,
`Do what you have to do’

By Marlene Naanes
South Florida Sun-Sentinel
Posted May 25 2006

Hollywood ? Javaris Granger wished his father was there
instead of him.

His father was on the phone, urging Granger, 15, to get the
gun they used for shooting practice. “Do what you have to
do,” his father said.

Granger did. He aimed the gun and fired at the violent
intruder.

Family and friends are awed by Granger’s bravery. “Anyone
who takes charge like that is definitely a hero,” said
Maxine Chandler, his mother.

Before the McArthur High School freshman fired the gun, he
kept a cool head and remembered his father’s shooting and
safety lessons during the chaos early Saturday morning.

His father, Lyndon Chandler, had left the house to visit a
friend at the hospital. His wife heard a knock at the door
and, thinking it was her husband, opened it. A stranger
grabbed at her; she pulled free and slammed the door.

It was 3:30 a.m.

Granger woke with a start, hearing his mother’s frantic
voice and something slamming against the front window.

He ran out to the dark living room and saw his mother
screaming as a man, cursing and muttering, threw a bicycle
at the window.

Granger yelled at the intruder to leave, while his mother
called his father on the phone and handed it to her son.
The stranger began turning the doorknob, intent on getting
in the home.

Within seconds, Granger ran into his parents’ bedroom, found
the safety box, unlocked it and loaded two guns for him and
his mother. He ran back to the living room as the intruder
threw a bicycle at the door and started kicking it in.

His mother was too shaken to take a gun, so she ran to
another bedroom where her daughters and visiting family
members were hiding.

“I was real scared and nervous, but I knew I had to stay
focused on what I had to do because my mom and the kids were
there,” Granger said.

The next moment the man kicked down the door and jumped into
the living room, yards from Granger.

“I didn’t want to hurt anybody, so I fired off a warning
shot,” the ninth-grader said.

The intruder didn’t leave until four shots later.

Since the incident, friends and family members have called
to congratulate the modest teenager who didn’t tell his
story until news reports made it hard to hide. His three
sisters call him brave, his dad is very proud of “the man of
the house” and his mom says her family would have died if
the man police later identified as Keil Jumper had laid
hands on them.

Jumper, 22, is in Memorial Regional Medical Center with two
gunshot wounds. He has a string of arrests dating to 2001,
including one for attacking a Seminole Reservation Police
Officer the day before he allegedly broke into Granger’s
home.

Granger does not face charges. The second oldest child in
the family, he often goes to the range at Markham Park to
practice shoot with his father. He was never a victim of
crime before, but calmly went through all the gun safety
steps his father taught him, even after one gun jammed after
the first shot Saturday.

He even locked up the guns after Jumper left, before he
checked on his mother. “My husband tried to get everyone to
learn the safety of a gun,” Chandler said. “It paid off.”