A sheriff’s deputy in North Carolina shot a black man while serving a search warrant, authorities said, sparking police tensions in the wake of the Derek Chauvin trial and the murder of Ma’Khia Bryant.
The deputy in Elizabeth City, close to the Atlantic coast, was placed on leave pending a review by the state office of inquiry, Pasquotank County Sheriff Tommy Wooten said at a news conference on Wednesday.
Wooten said the deputy shot Andrew Brown at about 8:30 a.m. on Wednesday morning. The deputy was wearing an active body camera at the time of the shooting, the sheriff said, refusing to identify the officer or say how many shots he fired.
Wooten did not give details of the order. Court records show that Brown was 42 years old and had a history of drug possession and a drug possession conviction.
An eyewitness said that Brown was shot trying to drive away, and that deputies shot him multiple times. The car slid out of Brown’s yard and eventually hit a tree, said Demetria Williams, who lives on the same street.
Williams said after hearing a shot, she ran outside, where she saw other shots fired at the car.
“When they opened the door, he was already dead,” Williams told the Associated Press. “He had slumped.”
She said officers tried to give him chest compressions.
A car body removed from the scene was found to have multiple bullet holes and a broken rear window.
Dozens of people gathered to express their anger at the scene of the shooting in Elizabeth, a town of about 18,000 people 274 km northeast of Raleigh. A large crowd, some with signs saying “Black Lives Matter” and “Stop Killing Unarmed Black Men”, later stood outside City Hall as the City Council held an emergency meeting,
A group later gathered in the parking lot of the sheriff’s office and a crowd that grew to over 200 blocked traffic on a main road.
“The police didn’t have to shoot my baby,” said Martha McCullen, Brown’s aunt who said she raised him after his parents died.
“Andrew Brown was a good person,” she said. He was about to get his children back. He was a good father. Now his children will never see him again. “
During the emergency council meeting, black members spoke out about their community’s fears amid multiple police shootings across the country and implored investigators to remain transparent.
“I’m scared like a black man,” said Alderman Gabriel Adkins. “I’m afraid I might be the next my family should see on the news that I’ve been shot.”
Adkins said companies near the shooting had their windows boarded up in anticipation of violence.
“We don’t just need transparency … we also need accountability,” said Councilor Darius Horton, who called for the immediate release of bodycam footage, the search warrant and a quick explanation of what led to the shooting. ‘We need answers. … Let’s not hide behind anything. “
Among those who gathered at the scene of the shooting was Keith Rivers, president of the NAACP’s Pasquotank province.
“When is it going to stop? We just got a verdict yesterday,” Rivers said, referring to the guilty sentences handed down in the trial of former Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin in the death of George Floyd.
“Is it open season now? At some point it has to stop. We have to start holding people accountable. “