Inside the Hardeeville police shootout that killed teen, injured officer
The state agency investigating last week’s fatal shootout between a 19-year-old and Hardeeville officers released its first statement on the incident Monday afternoon, saying the “altercation” began after police received a report of the teen trying to break into parked vehicles.
Jayden Holloway-Caldwell, a resident of the Pawleys Island area, was identified Monday morning as the person killed in the confrontation. He was pronounced dead at Savannah’s Memorial Health University Medical Center on Friday after the early morning incident.
After receiving a call about the reported vehicle break-ins around 4 a.m. Friday, officers with the Hardeeville Police Department responded to the Super 8 motel on U.S. 17 (Whyte Hardee Boulevard). They encountered an “armed man matching the description of the subject” in the parking lot of the nearby Shell gas station, according to the South Carolina Law Enforcement Division.
Officers reportedly identified Holloway-Caldwell as the person suspected in the vehicle break-in attempts. “During the encounter, there was an altercation and an exchange of gunfire,” the press release says.
Both Holloway-Caldwell and a Hardeeville officer were shot and subsequently hospitalized, according to SLED. The officer was “recovering from his injuries” as of Monday.
HPD requested that SLED investigate the incident, as is standard for all officer-involved shootings statewide.
One Hardeeville officer who fired multiple shots in the incident was placed on administrative leave, which is considered “standard procedure” while the state probe takes place, Chief of Police Sam Woodward said. He would not name the officer placed on leave, and it was unclear whether it was the same officer who was hospitalized.
Court records from Georgetown County, where Pawleys Island is located, show Holloway-Caldwell had been found guilty of shoplifting, malicious injury to property and two counts of trespassing, all misdemeanors. The convictions were reached through absentia bench trials, meaning he did not attend court as instructed and the trial was held without him.
Holloway-Caldwell had two pending felony charges for larceny from a vehicle, stemming from arrests within a week of each other in May 2025. In the first case, he was accused of smashing the window of a Range Rover and stealing a pocketbook inside, according to the Georgetown County Sheriff’s Office.
Back-to-back incidents in GA, SC
It was the second officer-involved shooting in the Lowcountry in less than 24 hours. Mark Dennis Whibbey, Jr., of Beaufort County, died Thursday as a result of multiple gunshots fired by Savannah Police Department officers.
Savannah police were responding to a report that Whibbey was waving a firearm on West Congress Street. He was ordered to drop the gun, but continued walking north towards the Savannah River instead, according to the Georgia Bureau of Investigation.
Whibbey “reached behind his back with his left hand toward an object in his rear waistband” and five SPD officers fired, striking him multiple times, GBI said.
