EXCLUSIVE: Family talks about face-to-face encounter with shooter

Just after 11:00 Tuesday night, the Hardrick family heard gunshots and a bang at the backdoor of their San Vincente Street home in Panama City Beach.

"Well, we heard two gun shots and my husband jumped up out of bed. My husband came to the backdoor and opened it up and he saw that this fence had come down and he realized there was someone standing within arms distance from him and pointing a gun at him and telling him, 'I'm coming in, I'm coming in.' My husband closed the door and he told me to call 911," Homeowner and witness Carrie Hardrick said.

The shooting suspect had banged on the family's sliding glass door in an attempt to get away from police officers who were chasing him following a shootout at a nearby apartment complex.

Carrie's husband, Chad, told her the suspect was limping and possibly bleeding from his right shoulder as he tried to hide from police.

But, the man was trapped in the family's backyard.

"Once they get in here, they're officially locked in the backyard, so there's no exiting unless you go over the fence or through the house," Carrie Hardrick said.

After the initial confrontation, the man, whose identity hasn't been released yet, ran to an area behind a shed in the Hardrick's backyard. That's when Chad Hardrick came out of the house and ran towards police who were searching for the shooter. Hardrick told us he told police the shooter was behind a shed in his yard. Police told him to go back inside and secure his family.

"That's when the police department came in and he began running to the far end of the fence, trying to get behind our shed. As he was going over, he fired two more shots and by then, the police had ran through the house, went to the other side and ended up encountering him."

Panama City Beach Police returned fire, killing the suspect.

It's something the Hardricks say they'll never forget.

"They had the whole entire house lined off as a crime scene. I've got two teenage boys in there, one's headed to college and I definitely did not want anything to happen to either one of them or, you know, myself or my husband, so it was very shocking, very shocking," Carrie Hardrick said.

While Hardrick said she was shaken and very fearful, she said she doesn't wish this upon anyone.

"I hate for the family of this person. They all have a brother or sister, mother or father, you know? But at this moment, it was either live or die. There was really nothing more that we could've done."

Hardrick told us, she's thankful for the quick and professional response of the Panama City Beach Police Department and its officers.

"Thank God, thank you Panama City Beach Police Department. If it wasn't for them, I mean, this man could've came in and killed all of us. I've never been so scared in my life, never," Hardrick said.

The two officers involved in the shootout with the yet-to-be-identified man are on paid administrative leave while the Florida Department of Law Enforcement does its investigation into the shooting. That's standard protocol in a shooting involving police. Once FDLE does its investigation, it will forward its findings to the State Attorney's Office, which will ultimately rule on whether the shooting was justified.