Parents of man killed at Galleria sue attorney general, Hoover police chief over records access

The parents of the 21-year-old man shot and killed by a Hoover police officer at the Riverchase Galleria on Thanksgiving night filed a lawsuit against the Alabama attorney general and Hoover police chief on Monday.

The parents, Emantic Bradford Sr. and April Pipkin, were joined by the American Civil Liberties Union and National Association for the Advancement of Colored People in asking a Jefferson County judge to force Attorney General Steve Marshall and police Chief Nick Derzis to release all records and videos related to the shooting of their son at the mall and subsequent investigation.

The attorney general on Feb. 5 issued a report saying the police officer’s actions were justified and that he would not submit any criminal charges to a grand jury for consideration.

According to the lawsuit, Marshall and Derzis have refused to release certain records and videos on the grounds that their law enforcement investigative reports are not subject to public disclosure and that such disclosure could compromise the pending criminal prosecution of Erron Brown, a Bessemer man charged with attempted murder in a shooting that happened just seconds before a Hoover police officer shot and killed Emantic “E.J.” Bradford Jr.

The lawsuit claims that such assertions that records are not subject to disclosure do not apply in this case or are overbroad.

The suit also noted that Marshall, in his Feb. 5 investigative report regarding the mall shootings, said that everything that occurred from the moment when Brown shot 18-year-old Brian Wilson could be publicly disclosed.

The lawsuit claims the attorney general’s office also refused to release the names of the four police officers who were the first four officers to respond to the shooting at the mall that night, claiming the attorney general understood that threats of physical harm, including death, had been made against police officers regarding the shooting.

Marshall’s statement is hearsay, lacks specificity and does not explain why these alleged threats trigger an exception to the Alabama Public Records Law, the suit says.

The officers were on duty, in uniform and acting under color of law at the time of the incident and “have no privacy interest in preventing the disclosure of their names,” the suit says.

The lawsuit also claims this is the first time the Alabama attorney general’s office has removed a district attorney from a homicide investigation since 1954, when the attorney general assigned special prosecutors to investigate and prosecute the murder of attorney general candidate Albert Patterson.

Bradford’s family, the ACLU and NAACP asked for all records and correspondence relied upon by the attorney general in his decision to take over the investigation.

They said that disclosure of all the records sought in this case serve an important role of transparency and accountability.

“It’s ludicrous and insulting that the state of Alabama thinks we should simply take their word about what happened, without letting us see the full and unedited video footage and without releasing the officer’s name who killed E.J.,” said Ben Crump, an attorney for Bradford’ family, in a press release. “In a state with the racial history of Alabama, why would anyone believe their account of a white officer shooting a black man, especially when they’re trying to hide some of the evidence? It’s so unfortunate they have left us with no choice but to sue for video they don’t want us to see and for the name of the officer to be released.”

Bradford’s father, in a press release, said the family is not going to trust the police version of what happened.

“It appears the state of Alabama has no shame, and if they are not going to turn over the video and release the name of the officer who killed E.J., we’re going to have to get a court order to make them,” the father said.

Randall Marshall, executive director of the ACLU of Alabama, said Bradford’s family deserves “transparency and accountability from the Police Department responsible for the death of an innocent black man.”

The 24-page report issued by the attorney general’s office in February said police officers saw Bradford running with a gun toward unarmed people and believed Bradford was about to murder two people and posed a threat to others in the area.

“Officer 1 was faced with such a ‘tense, uncertain and rapidly evolving’ situation when he saw E.J. Bradford running with a gun towards unarmed persons, and his response to that split-second situation was reasonable and based on an appropriate level of care for innocent lives,” the report said.

Benard Simelton, president of the Alabama NAACP, said his organization is very disappointed in how the attorney general took the case away from Jefferson County District Attorney Danny Carr, the first African-American district attorney for the county.

“Danny Carr was elected by the people of Jefferson County, and he should have been given the opportunity to do his job,” Simelton said. “Now, much of the crucial evidence is being withheld from the public, and most importantly, it’s being withheld from E.J.’s family.”

Marshall previously has said that Carr had a personal relationship with some of the people protesting the police shooting and that Carr, while he did not ask to be recused from the case or have an actual conflict of interest, acknowledged “a fair-minded, objective observer could conclude that a conflict exists.”

Mike Lewis, the communications director for the attorney general’s office, today said his office is preparing a response to the lawsuit filed Monday and will file it with the court at the appropriate time. The attorney general’s office will not have any further comment, he said.

A statement from the city of Hoover said the city will not produce any records that could compromise the ongoing criminal investigation or put the safety of the city’s police officers at risk. “The city will respond to the lawsuit in a timely manner,” the statement said.

The ACLU and NAACP also sought information from the Hoover Police Department regarding its use of force policies and training, guidelines for active shooter situations and implicit bias policies and training.

The Hoover Police Department already has provided some of those documents and is still in the process of providing others, the statement from Crump said.