MIAMI — Washington Redskins cornerback Sean Taylor squeezed a doctor’s hand from his hospital bed Monday night, giving his tense, exhausted family reason for hope after a daylong ordeal that began when Taylor was shot by an intruder at his Palmetto Bay home.
“I am happy. I am hopeful, but I really don’t know what else to say,” his mother, Donna Junor, said.
Miami-Dade police said that just after 1:45 a.m. Monday, Taylor and his girlfriend were startled awake by noises in his home. Taylor grabbed a machete from underneath his bed and went to investigate. He didn’t get far. An armed intruder fired at least one shot.
Taylor tumbled back into the bedroom, critically wounded in the groin, said lawyer Richard Sharpstein.
Taylor lost a “significant” amount of blood because the bullet damaged his femoral artery, and doctors were worried about blood flow to the brain, according to Sharpstein.
“The doctors are being very guarded about their prognosis,” Sharpstein said. “They’re being a little bit skeptical about either whether he might make it or whether it might cause some permanent brain injury.”
Taylor’s house is protected by a white wall with black gates, and a buzzer controls access. Its alarm had not been activated, a police official said, even though someone had broken into the house and rifled through Taylor’s possessions eight days earlier. That intruder left a kitchen knife on a bed.
After the shooting, Taylor’s girlfriend tried to call police from the house line, only to discover the line had been cut. She had to use her mobile phone to call 911, which delayed response time, said Redskins vice president Vinny Cerrato.
“This was a deliberate attack,” Cerrato said.
Sharpstein said Taylor, 24, remained unconscious in intensive care for hours after surgery, his brain at risk of injury from massive loss of blood.
His father, Pedro Taylor, the police chief of Florida City, said his son needed “much prayer.”
No arrests have been made.
