(16 May 2024)
RESTRICTION SUMMARY:
ASSOCIATED PRESS
Stonecrest, Georgia – 16 May 2024
1. SOUNDBITE (English) Benjamin Crump, Attorney:
“We knew it was at the wrong apartment. We know that.”
2. Wide of press conference as recording of police radio dispatch is played UPSOUND of radio recording:
“Uh, don’t have any further other than a male and female. It’s all fourth-party information from the front desk at the leasing office.”
3. SOUNDBITE (English) Benjamin Crump, Attorney:
“That’s important for two reasons. Number one, the police already know before they get there. They’ve been told that where the disturbance is at, there’s a male and a female, and that they are getting their information from the front desk at the leasing office. And it’s- as his mother and father and everybody continues to say, his girlfriend. Roger was in his apartment by himself.”
++WHITE FLASH++
4. SOUNDBITE (English) Benjamin Crump, Attorney:
“We have to call them to account, because if we don’t do it, they won’t do anything. And so people who criticize us talking about we’re doing a rush of judgment, not doing anything, how has that worked out for Black people in America? So that’s why we’re here, demanding justice for Roger Fortson.”
5. SOUNDBITE (English) Meka Fortson, Roger Fortson’s mother:
“Sheriff (Eric) Aden looked me in my face and told me if he sees anything wrong, that he put it on his mama, that he would apologize. Well, put it on your mama, because I’m standing right here.”
++EDIT ENDS ON SOUNDBITE++
STORYLINE:
A lawyer for the family of Roger Fortson said Thursday that the bodycam footage of the Florida sheriff’s deputy who killed the Black U.S. Air Force airman and police radio traffic from right after the shooting reinforce their assertion that the deputy was directed to the wrong apartment while responding to a domestic disturbance call that day.
In police radio traffic that lawyer Ben Crump played at a news conference surrounded by Fortson’s family, a dispatcher says all they know about the location of the disturbance is “fourth-party information.”
“Uh, don’t have any further other than a male and female,” the dispatcher tells officers. “It’s all fourth-party information from the front desk at the leasing office.”
Crump also highlighted two portions of the bodycam video in which the deputy asks the woman leading him around the complex, “Which door?” The woman responds, “Um… I’m not sure.” Seconds later, the woman tells the officer that she heard a disturbance two weeks ago, but “I wasn’t sure where it came from.”
Fortson, 23, was shot May 3 by an Okaloosa County sheriff’s deputy in the doorway of his apartment. Sheriff’s officials say the deputy acted in self-defense while responding to a call of a disturbance in progress at the apartment complex. Crump and Fortson’s family contend that the deputy went to the wrong unit and the shooting was unjustified.
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