Protesters marched in Alabama on Friday and Saturday to demand answers after police confessed that they shot and killed the wrong man at a mall shooting near Birmingham on Thanksgiving day.
Authorities shot and killed 21-year-old Emantic Fitzgerald Bradford Jr. who they initially maintained was the shooter, before admitting Friday that he was not the gunman who perpetrated the attack. They believe the gunman is still at large.
A gunman entered Riverchase Galleria near Birmingham on Thursday night and shot an 18-year-old man and 12-year-old girl, according to Hoover Police Captain Gregg Rector. Both victims were taken to the hospital, and the man remains in serious condition. (RELATED: The Media Is Telling The Wrong Story About Police And These Cops Are Proving It)
“New evidence now suggests that while Mr. Bradford may have been involved in some aspect of the altercation, he likely did not fire the rounds that injured the 18-year-old victim,” an Alabama Police Department statement reads regarding the incident and the deceased, BBC News reported Sunday.
Protesters marched through the mall on Friday evening and held a moment of silence for Bradford. Another large group of protesters, reportedly around 200, also marched Saturday demanding the police explain what had occurred.
“Where is the bodycam footage — why we ain’t seen it yet?” one protester said to CBS News.
My God.
American police just killed another “good guy with a gun.”
Emantic Fitzgerald Bradford Jr., better known as EJ, the son of a police officer, was an active duty officer for the Army, home for Thanksgiving.
Murdered by police yesterday in a mall shooting in Alabama. pic.twitter.com/xHsiOPUD5y
— Shaun King (@shaunking) November 24, 2018
Bradford had trained with the military but was discharged from the U.S. Army in August before completing his training, according to reports.
His mother, April Pipkins, told The New York Times on Saturday that Bradford was licensed to carry a gun and might have been trying to protect shoppers from the gunman during the Thanksgiving attack.
Gunman killed during Black Friday sales at Alabama mall. https://t.co/S1WiexgK1j pic.twitter.com/UvjBw0acGV
— NBC News (@NBCNews) November 23, 2018
“He was trying to be somebody who helped save people, yet he was killed,” said Pipkins’ lawyer, Benjamin Crump, BBC reported.
Crump is a national civil rights attorney who represented Trayvon Martin‘s family after the 17-year-old’s passing in 2012.
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