MIAMI (AP) — Police officers responding to a disturbance call at a Florida apartment complex burst into the wrong unit and shot a black U.S. Air Force airman who was home alone when they considering he was armed with a gun, the man’s family’s lawyer said. said Wednesday.
Senior Airman Roger Fortson, 23, based at the Hurlburt Field Special Operations Wing, was in his off-base apartment in Fort Walton Beach when the May 3 shooting occurred.
Civil rights attorney Ben Crump said in a statement that Fortson was on a Facetime call with a woman at the time of the encounter.
According to Crump, the woman, whom Crump did not identify, said Fortson was alone in his apartment when he heard a knock at the door. He asked who was there but got no answer. A few minutes later, Fortson heard a louder bang but saw no one when he looked through the peephole, Crump said, citing the woman’s account.
The woman said Fortson was worried and went to get his gun, which Crump said was legally his.
As Fortson returned to his living room, officers burst in the door, saw that Fortson was armed and shot him six times, according to Crump’s statement. The woman said Fortson was on the ground and said, “I can’t breathe” after being shot, Crump said.
Fortson died at the hospital, officials said. The deputy involved in the shooting has been placed on administrative leave pending an investigation.
The woman said Fortson did not cause a disturbance during their Facetime call and believed the deputies must have the wrong apartment, according to Crump’s statement.
“The circumstances surrounding Roger’s death raise serious questions that demand immediate answers from authorities, particularly given a witness’s alarming statement that police went to the wrong apartment,” the statement said. Crump.
“We are calling for transparency in the investigation into Roger’s death and for the immediate release of the body camera video to the family,” Crump said. “His family and the public deserve to know what happened in the moments leading up to this tragedy.”
Crump is a nationally recognized attorney based in Tallahassee, Florida. He has been involved in several high-profile shooting cases involving Black people, including those of Ahmaud Arbery, Trayvon Martin, Breonna Taylor, Tire Nichols, and George Floyd.
Crump and Fortson’s family plans to speak at a news conference in Fort Walton Beach Thursday morning.
The Okaloosa County Sheriff’s Office did not immediately respond to an email or voicemail from The Associated Press seeking comment on Crump’s claims. But Sheriff Eric Aden released a statement on Facebook Wednesday afternoon expressing sadness over the shooting.
“At this time, we humbly ask for the patience of our community as we work to understand the facts that led to this tragic event,” Aden said.
The sheriff’s office said in a statement last week that a deputy responding to a call about a disturbance in progress at the apartment complex responded in self-defense after encountering an armed man. The office did not provide details on what type of disturbances deputies were responding to or who called them.
The sheriff’s office also declined to immediately identify the responding deputies or their races. Authorities said earlier this week that the Florida Department of Law Enforcement and the local district attorney’s office would investigate the shooting.
FDLE spokeswoman Gretl Plessinger told The Associated Press on Wednesday that it was highly unlikely the agency would make any further comments until the investigation is complete.
Fortson was assigned to the 4th Special Operations Squadron as a Special Missions Airman, where one of his roles as a member of the squadron’s AC-130J Ghostrider crew was to task the 30mm and 105mm guns of the combat helicopter during missions.
Fortson’s death bears striking similarities to other black people killed in recent years by police in their homes, in circumstances where officers were responding to the wrong address or responding to calls for service using gratuitous use of the deadly force.
In 2018, a white former Dallas police officer fatally shot Botham Jean, an unarmed black man, after mistaking his apartment for his. Amber Guyger, the former officer, was convicted of murder the following year and sentenced to 10 years in prison.
In 2019, a white former officer in Fort Worth, Texas, shot Atatiana Jefferson through a back window of her home after responding to a non-emergency call reporting that Jefferson’s front door was open. Aaron Dean, the former officer, was convicted of manslaughter in 2022 and sentenced to nearly 12 years in prison.
Crump represented families in both cases as part of his ongoing effort to hold police accountable for the killings of Black people.
“What I try to do, as much as I can, even sometimes alone, is to increase the value of black lives,” Crump told the Associated Press in 2021 following the conviction of a former Minneapolis officer for the murder of George Floyd.
Fort Walton Beach is located between Panama City Beach and Pensacola in the Florida Panhandle.
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Associated Press journalists Curt Anderson in St. Petersburg, Fla., and Aaron Morrison in New York contributed to this story.
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