Photo Raises Questions About Possibe Police Coverup in the Shooting Death of Jermaine McBean...
Options
stringer bell
Members Posts: 26,212 ✭✭✭✭✭
http://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/photo-raises-doubts-about-police-shooting-jermaine-mcbean-n366386
Photo Raises Doubts About Police Shooting of Jermaine McBean - NBC News
After Florida police shot Jermaine McBean to death as he walked home with an unloaded air rifle, they said there was no reason to believe he did not hear their orders to drop the weapon and that he pointed it at them.
But a newly emerged photo that shows headphones in McBean's ears immediately after the 2013 shooting raises questions about the police version of events, including why the white earbuds were later found stuffed in the dead computer expert's pocket.
And another aspect of the police account is also being contradicted — by a man who called 911 in alarm when he saw McBean walking around with the air rifle but who also says McBean never pointed it at police or anyone else.
Michael Russell McCarthy, 58, told NBC News that McBean had the Winchester Model 1000 Air Rifle balanced on his shoulders behind his neck, with his hand over both ends, and was turning around to face police when one officer began shooting.
"He [McBean] couldn't have fired that gun from the position he was in. There was no possible way of firing it and at the same time hitting something," McCarthy said. "I kind of blame myself, because if I hadn't called it might not have happened."
Nearly two years later, the shooting is still the subject of an "active investigation" by prosecutors. McBean's family filed a wrongful death and misconduct lawsuit against the sheriff's office several weeks ago.
Their attorney, civil rights lawyer David Schoen, says the photo of McBean with the headphones — which he provided to NBC News — is evidence of a "coverup."
The witness who took it, a nurse who asked to remain anonymous, says she pointed out the earbuds to police at the scene, after they rebuffed her offer to provide first aid to the dying man.
A transcript shows that Deputy Peter Peraza, who fired the fatal shots, repeatedly told sheriff's investigators that he did not see anything in McBean's ears.
And the homicide detective who led an internal review told McBean's relatives in an email that officers on the scene "confirmed" he was not wearing a earpiece — after the family explained that he always had them on when he was out walking. The detective said the buds were found in his pocket, with his phone, at the hospital.
"I was highly upset," McBean's mother, Jennifer Young, said of the moment she learned about the photo. "I said, 'They lied to me. What else have they lied about?'"
The Broward Sheriff's office declined to comment on the lawsuit, the investigation and its decision to give Peraza a commendation three months after the shooting.
A spokesman for the Broward State's Attorney's Office, Ron Ishoy, said there is an "active investigaton" that will be presented to a grand jury and declined to answer questions about the photo or McCarthy's account.
The union lawyer who represented Peraza when he gave a statement to homicide Detective Efrain Torres did not respond to requests for comment.
In his videotaped statement to homicide investigators, Peraza said that he fired his service weapon after McBean "pulled the weapon up over his head and grabbed it and started to turn and point it at us."
"I felt like my life was threatened. I had that feeling like if I would not go home that day," said Peraza, who has been on the force for 14 years but spent a decade of that working in the detention center.
"I felt like I could've been killed. My sergeant could've been killed. He could've shot somebody in the pool area. So as soon as he did turn and point his weapon at us, that's when I fired my duty weapon."
Another officer at the scene, Sgt. Richard Lacerra, told investigators that McBean "spun around" and brought the rifle over his shoulders. "I thought at that point and time he was gonna swing and point the rifle at us," he said. "And the next thing I know there was gunshots."
Lacerra said that after McBean fell, the wounded man said to him, "It was just a BB gun."
McBean, who had two degrees from Pace University in New York, worked in information technology at a Fort Lauderdale ad agency, servicing the company's computers. He wore his earbuds to listen to music, and to handle service calls, family said. He did not have a criminal record, according to Schoen and to a search of public records.
An autopsy report showed he had the marijuana compound THC in his blood and ? . An expert at UCLA told NBC News the level was on the high side but the test does not reveal whether someone is intoxicated from recent usage or used in the past.
McBean was diagnosed with bipolar disorder in 2010, shortly before he moved to Florida after a divorce, his family said. Following an episode at work six days before his death — a co-worker told police he was acting "manic" and "irrational" — he was taken to the hospital and had his medication adjusted.
When he was released, the co-worker told police, he was back to normal but decided to take the following week off.
On the afternoon of July 31, 2013, he walked to a local ? shop where he purchased the Winchester. A police report says the shopkeeper recalled he wanted to buy a shotgun but decided on the air rifle. His family said he never showed an interest in guns and suspect he bought it on a whim.
Comments
-
McCarthy said he was in his car at a red light when McBean crossed the street in front of him, at a distance of six to eight feet, with the rifle.
"He had a white plastic bag around the center of it, but the barrel was sticking out one end and the stock was sticking out the other end," he said. "It was obvious it was a rifle. To be honest with you, the gun was painted camo but I wasn't sure if it was a fake gun or a BB gun.
"He changed his position two, three times, mainly just walking down the street with it. First thing I thought was this guy is going to ? someone."
McCarthy called 911 and the tapes show he told the dispatcher, with urgency and alarm in his voice, that it looked like a .22 caliber rifle or a pellet gun. "I will say this: He's not like acting crazy or aggressive with it, he's not shaking it or nothing," he told them. "I'm not going to say he's waving it, he's just walking along with it."
Two other people also called 911. One of them, a woman, said: "He's carrying what looks like some sort of BB gun, shotgun, I don't know what it is [but] it's camouflaged, and he's screaming really loud to himself. It could be a fake gun, but it looks like it could be real, too."
While McCarthy was on the phone, he saw McBean turn into an apartment complex. He said "cops came flying by" and he followed the last car onto the grounds.
Looking out his passenger window, he said, he could see officers corralling residents away from a pool off to the right and three officers moving in on McBean. Then he heard three shots.
"Bam. Bam. Bam," he said.
"He [McBean] dropped to the ground, the rifle bounced off the ground and I was sitting in my truck going, 'What the hell is this!'" he added.
"They all converged over the top of him and it looked like he was having a convulsion. You could tell he was in serious pain."
Police interviewed a number of other witnesses, including several people who were in or near the pool and variously described McBean as acting "crazy," "weird" or "high," according to a sheriff's report. They recalled police shouting at him, but the report does not say they saw him point the gun at officers.
McCarthy told police the "rifle was still on the subject's shoulders" when the gunshots rang out, a different sheriff's report confirms.
The disabled fisherman told NBC News he was traumatized by the incident and had trouble sleeping for a month afterward.
"His birthday would have been the end of next month and I have his picture and the death [funeral] card above the computer at my house. I think about this guy constantly," he said.
He said he has since met McBean's family.
"They don't blame me," he said. "I kind of blame myself, because if I hadn't called it might not have happened. I would still make the call but I regretted it because I had no idea they were going to zip into this place and shoot him dead."
McBean's older brother, Alfred McBean, an IT architect who lives in Pompano Beach, said he was a gentle soul who loved his work, liked going to amusement parks with his nieces and nephews, enjoyed deep-sea fishing and doted on his mother.
He said he is certain of two things: that his brother did not hear police because he was listening to loud music on the earbuds he always wore and that he would not have defied police if he did hear them.
"They could have just tackled him, or just tased him. Why shoot him three times?" Alfred Mc Bean said. "Criminal charges need to be filed."
His mother agreed.
"He's very missed, he was very loved and he was a loving and caring person himself," she said. "I can't wait to get justice for him."
-
"POSSIBLE police coverup"??????
Shouldn't that read: "OBVIOUS police coverup"? -
Its crazy how white ppl walk around open carrying assault rifles and never have any problems but brothers are constantly getting shot down for carrying bb guns. ? crazy. FTP
-
Its crazy how white ppl walk around open carrying assault rifles and never have any problems but brothers are constantly getting shot down for carrying bb guns. ? crazy. FTP
Yeah, let's be real, if you're a black man walking around with a gun out in the open, you're asking for trouble. I'm not even just talking about the police. We already know they are going to go overboard, but you also got to worry about people calling 911 and making it seem like you're in the process of robbing someone.
It's like with the dude in Walmart in OH. The cops were out of line with what they did, but you can imagine they would be on high alert when the person that called them lied and said he was walking around the store pointing it at people. -
Dam ? look like me and has the same profession, feel alot more bothered by tbisw than usual
-
Disgusting. This should be used every time they say "we felt threatened"
-
Breaks my heart every time I read sutten like this.
-
I have no confidence that his family will get justice.
-
-
the white dude who called and felt bad about it thought that the police treat black men the same way they do white men.
In other words, the dude who called saw a person with what might be a gun, and called the cops thinking the cops will come and question him and get down to whats going on.
He didnt realize that cops only do that for white people. When it comes to minorities, especially black men, cops shoot first and ask questions later.
And now, the white dude who called is saying he feels bad cause he didnt think the cops would come and shoot right away.
Smh. This is the definition of white privilege. Its not that they have advantages in society and they chose to ignore they do and act like they dont, its the fact that they never even have to take time to think about unfair treatment of blacks and they can live their whole life in a bubble. -
stringer bell wrote: »
Cops gettingg awarded for killing an innocent man smh . A special place in hell will be reserved for them -
? plzzzzz...the white dude who called and felt bad about it thought that the police treat black men the same way they do white men.
In other words, the dude who called saw a person with what might be a gun, and called the cops thinking the cops will come and question him and get down to whats going on.
He didnt realize that cops only do that for white people. When it comes to minorities, especially black men, cops shoot first and ask questions later.
And now, the white dude who called is saying he feels bad cause he didnt think the cops would come and shoot right away.
Smh. This is the definition of white privilege. Its not that they have advantages in society and they chose to ignore they do and act like they dont, its the fact that they never even have to take time to think about unfair treatment of blacks and they can live their whole life in a bubble.
That i feel bad ? , is to exonerate himself.
Would that cac call the cops, if he were to see a another cac with a gun????
Like that indian guy, who was mistaken for a blk man . Would that cac that called the cops, call the cops on that Indian man, if that Indian man he thought was blk, was a cac? Would he assume he was casing garages??
Like Tamir, the cac caller knew it was most likely A toy, would he call the pigs, if Tamir was a pasty cac boy?
ya ? can eat a ? for being stupid.
-
Its crazy how white ppl walk around open carrying assault rifles and never have any problems but brothers are constantly getting shot down for carrying bb guns. ? crazy. FTP
I wonder what would have happened to the black dude if the cameras weren't present.
-
the white dude who called and felt bad about it thought that the police treat black men the same way they do white men.
In other words, the dude who called saw a person with what might be a gun, and called the cops thinking the cops will come and question him and get down to whats going on.
He didnt realize that cops only do that for white people. When it comes to minorities, especially black men, cops shoot first and ask questions later.
And now, the white dude who called is saying he feels bad cause he didnt think the cops would come and shoot right away.
Smh. This is the definition of white privilege. Its not that they have advantages in society and they chose to ignore they do and act like they dont, its the fact that they never even have to take time to think about unfair treatment of blacks and they can live their whole life in a bubble.
White people dont realize what white privilege is because they don't have to. They get offended rather than try to understand.
Came across this blog yesterday, written by a white female speaking on white privilege.
http://splashsurfer45.blogspot.com/2014/07/white-privilege.html?m=1
Not gonna copy and paste, it's too long, but it speaks to exactly how whites see this and what happens when they finally realize what this is -
the white dude who called and felt bad about it thought that the police treat black men the same way they do white men.
In other words, the dude who called saw a person with what might be a gun, and called the cops thinking the cops will come and question him and get down to whats going on.
He didnt realize that cops only do that for white people. When it comes to minorities, especially black men, cops shoot first and ask questions later.
And now, the white dude who called is saying he feels bad cause he didnt think the cops would come and shoot right away.
Smh. This is the definition of white privilege. Its not that they have advantages in society and they chose to ignore they do and act like they dont, its the fact that they never even have to take time to think about unfair treatment of blacks and they can live their whole life in a bubble.
White people dont realize what white privilege is because they don't have to. They get offended rather than try to understand.
Came across this blog yesterday, written by a white female speaking on white privilege.
http://splashsurfer45.blogspot.com/2014/07/white-privilege.html?m=1
Not gonna copy and paste, it's too long, but it speaks to exactly how whites see this and what happens when they finally realize what this is
White ppl kno full n well about white privelege...
They just don't give a ? .
N y should they? they're Not the ones Getting ? over..
Blk ppl dont give a ? about themselves, but want white ppl to give a ? about them ...
-
They don't realize it, though, because they're not affected by it. It's ignorance.
-
stringer bell wrote: »
Cops gettingg awarded for killing an innocent man smh . A special place in hell will be reserved for them
Was it for killing that man though? That is not clear. -
stringer bell wrote: »
Should we post this the next time a white person ask why we aren't outrage over a black man that ? an innocent white person or a cop?
-
-
They don't realize it, though, because they're not affected by it. It's ignorance.
They realize it, n are aware, but they dont give a ? , because they're not affected...
Hence when other ppl ,especially blk ppl, do things like move into white neighborhoods , attend white schools.
Whites become repulsive, as if they're threatened. THere threatned alright. Because Their priveleged is threatened.
All that ,they dont know ? , is tricknology that the devils like to play..
-
Don't people know that it is LEGAL to carry a rifle? Quit calling the police you uninformed dummies! Think you're 'helping' and being a hero, when in fact you're getting people killed. Mind your business. You don't think that police officers are going to ? someone when they have their guns on. Extra helpful ass folks!
-
the white dude who called and felt bad about it thought that the police treat black men the same way they do white men.
In other words, the dude who called saw a person with what might be a gun, and called the cops thinking the cops will come and question him and get down to whats going on.
He didnt realize that cops only do that for white people. When it comes to minorities, especially black men, cops shoot first and ask questions later.
And now, the white dude who called is saying he feels bad cause he didnt think the cops would come and shoot right away.
Smh. This is the definition of white privilege. Its not that they have advantages in society and they chose to ignore they do and act like they dont, its the fact that they never even have to take time to think about unfair treatment of blacks and they can live their whole life in a bubble.
White people dont realize what white privilege is because they don't have to. They get offended rather than try to understand.
Came across this blog yesterday, written by a white female speaking on white privilege.
http://splashsurfer45.blogspot.com/2014/07/white-privilege.html?m=1
Not gonna copy and paste, it's too long, but it speaks to exactly how whites see this and what happens when they finally realize what this is
They know exactly what white privilege is acknowledging it though hurts their feelings and ? with their pride. By acknowledging white privilege they can no longer look down on and talk that "pull yourself up by the bootstraps" ? because it would now be universal knowledge that white people don't work harder than anyone else. They rigged the game for whites and they reaping the benefits of doing so -
http://www.nytimes.com/2015/05/31/us/a-florida-police-killing-like-many-disputed-and-little-noticed.html?_r=3A Florida Police Killing Like Many, Disputed and Little Noticed
OAKLAND PARK, Fla. — The witnesses who saw a Broward County deputy sheriff ? a man who had strolled through his apartment complex with an unloaded air rifle propped on his shoulders agreed: Just before he was gunned down, Jermaine McBean had ignored the officers who stood behind him shouting for him to drop his weapon.
Nothing, the officer swore under oath, prevented Mr. McBean from hearing the screaming officers.
Newly obtained photographic evidence in the July 2013 shooting of Mr. McBean, a 33-year-old computer-networking engineer, shows that contrary to repeated assertions by the Broward Sheriff’s Office, he was wearing earbuds when he was shot, suggesting that he was listening to music and did not hear the officers. The earphones somehow wound up in the dead man’s pocket, records show.
“I want justice for something that went totally wrong.” Mr. McBean’s mother, Jennifer Young, said in an interview. She added that she believed officers had profiled her son because he was black.
A federal wrongful death lawsuit filed May 11 accused the Broward Sheriff’s Office of tampering with evidence and obstructing justice. The suit alleges that the deputy who shot Mr. McBean perjured himself and that the department covered it up by giving him a bravery award shortly after the killing, while the shooting was still under investigation.
From Ferguson, Mo., to Baltimore to Cleveland, the nation seems awash in disputed, high-profile cases of police violence. But a look at disputed cases in Florida is a reminder of how frequently they arise far from the limelight and how many questions surround the way they are investigated. The issue is particularly acute in Florida, where State Department of Law Enforcement statistics show the number of fatal police shootings has tripled in the past 15 years, even as crime has plummeted.
In South Florida’s Broward County, no officer has been charged in a fatal on-duty police shooting since 1980, a period that covers 168 shooting deaths.
“The court never goes against the police,” said Rajendra Ramsahai, whose brother-in-law, Deosaran Maharaj, was killed by a Broward County deputy last year. “They are always ruling in the officer’s favor.”
In civil wrongful death cases throughout South Florida, lawyers discovered that files were missing, that dashboard camera videos had been erased and that police department accounts sometimes did not match the evidence. Cases like Mr. McBean’s underscore how law enforcement agencies that handle their own shooting investigations can be exposed to criticism years after the crime-scene tape has been taken down and the television cameras are gone.
Nearly two years after his death, and months after The New York Times began inquiring about the case, the state attorney for Broward County has subpoenaed a key witness to testify before a grand jury and assigned the case to a public corruption prosecutor.
There are signs that some cases are getting more attention. The death of a black man struck multiple times by Coconut Creek police officers firing Taser stun guns was ruled a homicide this month by the Broward County medical examiner’s office. The death led to the resignation of the police chief, Michael Mann, in March after it was revealed that three of the four officers involved were not certified in Taser use. The family of the victim has asked the United States attorney general for an independent investigation.
In 2013, law enforcement agencies around the state asked the Department of Law Enforcement for help in 50 use-of-force and shooting investigations. A year later, the requests had more than doubled, to 103. Department officials asked the Legislature for $1.6 million to hire 14 additional special agents to handle the load.
“In general across the country, I don’t think the communities trust their police enough anymore,” said Charles Drago, a Broward sheriff reserve officer who was deputy chief of staff for law enforcement for former Gov. Charlie Crist. “They demand more transparency.”
In 2011, a string of fatal shootings in Miami led to a United States Department of Justice investigation into the department. The Justice Department found an unconstitutional “pattern or practice” of excessive use of force, which led to reforms and federal oversight.
The federal agency confirmed that it opened an inquiry last month into the 2013 death of Charles Eimers, a Michigan man who died after he was stopped for an illegal lane change in Key West. Police dashboard camera videos that could have shed light on his death were erased, even while one Taser device recording captured an officer suggesting that the police should get their stories straight and another by a tourist showed a vastly different event than the one the police had initially described.
The Broward County public defender, Howard Finkelstein, said he had asked the Justice Department to investigate policing in his county but had received no response. “When you look at the fact that every single person ever shot in Broward County by a cop deserved it, that’s stunning,” Mr. Finkelstein said.
Michael J. Satz, the state attorney for Broward County since 1976, declined to discuss open cases but defended his office’s record. “Just in the last five years, we have charged 92 law enforcement officers with criminal offenses,” Mr. Satz said in a statement. “We take all police misconduct very seriously.”
He said the perception of a lack of fairness was “unfortunate,” and stressed that a grand jury reviewed every police shooting in his county and that the reports were later made public.
Mr. McBean was one of four people killed by the Broward Sheriff’s Office in six weeks during the summer of 2013. Many of the department’s 17 fatal police shootings in the past five years took years before they were presented to a grand jury, delays that Lawyers and families of those killed say are designed to circumvent the truth.
Prosecutors finally contacted key witnesses last week, a few days after the family filed a lawsuit, the family lawyer, David I. Schoen, said. Among the witnesses whom prosecutors interviewed last week was Michael R. McCarthy, who called 911 that July afternoon to report a black man walking down a busy North Dixie Highway with what appeared to be a rifle.
“In my view, they shot this guy for no reason,” Mr. McCarthy said, holding back tears. “I think about him all the time. To this moment, I think I brought this guy to his death.”
Mr. McBean, who had a history of mental illness, had the day off from his job at an advertising agency because he had just been released from a hospital. He had been admitted for a few days because he briefly stopped taking his medication, his brother, Alfred McBean, said.
In a move that baffled his family, he walked to a pawnshop where he paid $106 for a green camouflage-colored Winchester 1000 air rifle, a device that uses compressed air to fire pellets but can be easily mistaken for a hunting rifle. Three people called 911 to report him, saying he was “screaming to himself” but perhaps holding a toy. -
A deputy, a sergeant and a lieutenant went up behind Mr. McBean after he turned into the complex where he lived, and they shouted for him to drop the weapon. After ignoring them, Mr. McBean at one point stopped and started to turn to his right, when the deputy, behind him on his left, began to fire, records and interviews show. Mr. McBean fell on his back, howled in pain and said, “It was just a BB gun.”
In a sworn statement, the lieutenant said Mr. McBean had pointed the weapon “in a menacing manner,” something Mr. McCarthy and another witness interviewed disputed. Mr. McCarthy has not been called to testify before the grand jury, the family’s lawyer said.
Sheriff’s office homicide detectives investigating the shooting interviewed several people who were gathered at the nearby pool, but did not ask them whether Mr. McBean had pointed the gun at the officers, transcripts show.
The deputy who shot him, Peter Peraza, said he had feared for his life, convinced that Mr. McBean was about to start firing. Deputy Peraza was asked at least five times whether there was any reason that Mr. McBean would not have heard the officers’ commands, such as whether there was anything in his ears. Each time, Deputy Peraza said no. Investigators learned last week that a neighbor had taken a picture that clearly shows white earphone cables coming out of Mr. McBean’s ears and two officers very close to the body.
Jeff Marano, president of the Broward County Police Benevolent Association, said he was confident that Deputy Peraza, who is Hispanic, would be cleared. He said despondent people sometimes point unloaded BB guns at police officers in an effort to die by “suicide by cop” and added that a police officer is killed in America every 50 hours.
“I am confident that the deputy took appropriate action based on what he knew at the time and the threat he perceived at the time,” Mr. Marano said.
Sheriff Scott Israel declined to comment on the pending case, but insisted that the sheriff’s office conducted thorough investigations of its shootings. Sheriff Israel recently lost a whistle-blower lawsuit filed by a former homicide detective who said he had been demoted to patrolman after reporting that excessive force was used on a homicide suspect. A judge threw out the verdict because of a problem with one of the jurors.
“There is no thin blue line here,” Sheriff Israel said. “We turn out honest and forthright investigations.”
He said that the nationwide spike in shootings of unarmed men concerned him, and that he had sent a message to his deputies that anyone who shot an unarmed suspect would have to answer to him. The sheriff acknowledged that the investigations were slow to conclude.
“Getting it right is more important than getting it fast,” he said. -
stringer bell wrote: »
http://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/cop-who-shot-jermaine-mcbean-got-award-during-investigation-n367811Cop Who Shot Jermaine McBean Got Award During Investigation
A Florida sheriff is denying allegations of misconduct by his officers in connection with the 2013 shooting death of a man who was carrying an unloaded air rifle.
But his office's decision to give a bravery award to the deputy who fired the fatal shots — while the incident was still under investigation — is now being reviewed.
"There was no cover-up," Broward County Sheriff Scott Israel said in a statement.
Deputy Peter Peraza fatally shot Jermaine McBean, 33, on the grounds of his Oakland Park apartment complex after three people called 911 to report a man walking around with a rifle.
The incident is drawing fresh scrutiny two years later because a newly emerged photo shows McBean, 33, wearing in-ear headphones immediately after being shot — contradicting police statements.
Police documents show that Peraza insisted to a homicide detective that there was nothing in McBean's ears that would have stopped him from hearing police orders to drop the rifle — and the detective told the family that officers at the scene "confirmed" that.
Detectives are on fact-finding missions. They exhausted all investigative leads, took dozens of statements and turned the case over to the State Attorney's Office for its independent review and subsequent grand jury review, Israel said in a statement.
"There was no cover-up. The woman who took the photo never shared it with our investigators."
A spokeswoman for the office declined to elaborate on the statement.
The photo was provided to NBC News by a lawyer for McBean's family with permission from the woman who took it. The lawyer, David Schoen, said the woman did not give the photo to police who knocked on her door afterward because she was afraid.
Less than a month after the shooting, Peraza and another officer involved in the incident, Sgt. Richard LaCerra, were nominated for the prestigious Gold Cross award through an internal memo that failed to mention McBean's weapon was a Winchester 1000 Air Rifle that wasn't loaded.
The memo said McBean, 33, did not comply with orders to drop the rifle as he walked through his Oakland Park apartment complex, near children swimming in a pool, and pointed it in the direction of officers in a "threatening manner."
"Deputy Peraza ... fearing for the lives of all involved began to fire," said the memo written by Lt. Brad Ostroff.
"Having been on many critical shooting incidents with this agency in 27 plus years, I can say without hesitation the actions displayed by Sergeant LaCerra and Deputy Peraza were selfless, honorable and brave. They placed themselves in harm's way to ensure civilians were protected and regardless of the safety to themselves."
Two months later, Peraza and LaCerra were presented with the awards at the African-American Research Library and Cultural Center in Fort Lauderdale.
At the time of the nomination and the reward, the shooting was under investigation by both the sheriff's office and by the Broward State's Attorney's Office, documents show.
"It's crazy," said Schoen, who is representing the McBean family in a wrongful-death and misconduct suit against the sheriff's office.
"They know by then that they just tragically shot an unarmed guy who had an air rifle that wasn't loaded, who was about to go into his apartment."
The sheriff's office said the decision to bestow the award is being reviewed.
A witness to the shooting has contradicted one piece of the narrative described in the nomination memo and in Peraza's statement, saying that McBean did not take the air rifle off his shoulders and point it at officers before he was shot in the chest.
Michael Russell McCarthy, a fisherman, said he called 911 when he saw McBean walking home from a pawnshop with the rifle because he did not know if it was real or fake and he feared he might ? someone.
He told NBC News that when McBean strode onto the grounds of the complex, the rifle was on his shoulders and behind his neck and that he never moved it from that position.
"He [McBean] couldn't have fired that gun from the position he was in. There was no possible way of firing it and at the same time hitting something," McCarthy said. "I kind of blame myself, because if I hadn't called it might not have happened."
Another witness interviewed by NBC News, who asked to remain anonymous, said she thought McBean looked "high" or "strange" when she saw him walking with the gun, but she did not see him point it anyone and did not see the actual shooting.
McBean — a computer expert who worked at an advertising agency — had the marijuana component THC in his blood when he was killed. He had been diagnosed with bipolar disorder, but his family said he had no history of violent behavior, and he did not have a criminal record.
The police union lawyer who represented Peraza when he gave his initial statement has not responded to requests for comments, and the head of the police union also did not reply to a request for comment on Monday.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EvW_zBvJlsA
