The family of Andrew Brown Jr. will continue their fight to have deputies’ body camera videos released to the public after seeing another portion of the footage themselves, lawyers said on Wednesday (May 12). According to CNN, attorneys representing Brown’s relatives have recommitted their efforts to push for the full release of all videos.
“We will move fairly quickly on that matter to go before the court to make our arguments to get the videos released,” attorney Harry Daniels told the outlet.
The announcement arrives after the family was permitted to watch six bodycam and dashcam videos from Brown’s fatal shooting on Tuesday (May 11). As reported by REVOLT, attorneys for the family said that even the redacted and limited footage showed Brown’s shooting was “absolutely, unequivocally unjustified.”
“Today was an emotional day. I was able to view the footage with two of Mr. Brown’s sons,” attorney Chase Lynch told CNN. “We were absolutely able to see Mr. Brown sitting in his car, afraid. The look on his face; he was terrified and was in shock when they arrived on the scene.”
Brown’s family was allowed to watch a snippet of redacted bodycam footage last month. A North Carolina law and judge prevented the full footage from being released to the public. Family attorney Chantel Cherry-Lassiter said Brown’s sons have only been shown 20 minutes of the two-hour footage, which the Pasquotank County sheriff says is all the court has allowed them to share.
Elizabeth City residents have continued to call on city officials to publicly release the full footage. Demands for the footage increased after the sheriff’s department claimed Brown reversed his car toward deputies before they opened fire, which Brown’s family attorneys have denied.
“At no point did we ever see Mr. Brown make contact with law enforcement,” Lynch told reporters after viewing the footage. “We were able to see where they possibly reached out to make contact [with] him, but we did not see any actions on Mr. Brown’s part where he made contact with them or try to go in their direction. In fact, he did just the opposite.”
After a deputy fired the first shot, Lynch said, Brown reversed his car “several feet, if not yards away, from the police who were there.” Brown then drove in the opposite direction of the group of deputies, who began shooting at him, Lynch said.