Rayshard Brooks: Atlanta cop Devin Brosnan suffered a concussion when his head hit pavement during altercation
Atlanta Police officer Devin Brosnan who was one of the officers involved in the fatal shooting of Rayshard Brooks had suffered a concussion. He had also sustained injuries during the altercation with Brooks, 27, the officers' attorney revealed during an interview with CNN. An attorney for Brosnan, Don Samuel, said, "Devin ends up taking out his Taser and yelling at him to ‘stop fighting, stop fighting'."
"Mr. Brooks grabbed the Taser from him and shoots … Devin gets shot with the Taser," Samuel added. At that point, Brosnan had fallen over and landed on the pavement and had a concussion. The attorney also shared that the prosecutors in the case had not examined the medical records of the officer, Breitbart reports.
On Friday, June 12, officer Garrett Rolfe and Brosnan had responded to a call from a parking lot of a Wendy's. Brooks had been drunk and had fallen asleep at the eatery's drive-in. The officers reportedly administered a sobriety test, which he failed. After he resisted arrest, Brooks grabbed the Brosnan's Taser and fled on foot. He then turned back and pointed the Taser at a police officer, at which point he was shot dead.
The incident led to public outrage and as a result, Rolfe was fired and Police Chief Erika Shields resigned. As reported by the NY Post, Samuel said that Brosnan was unaware that Brooks was shot when "he put his foot on the arm to make sure he didn’t have access to a weapon."
"It’s not an assault. It’s a man suffering from a concussion," Samuel said. According to WSB-TV Rolfe is facing "11 counts, including felony murder and aggravated assault, criminal damage to property and violations to his oath of office,” while Brosnan faces “aggravated assault and two violations of oath of office."
Fulton County District Attorney Paul Howard Jr. said that the late 27-year-old Brooks "did not pose an immediate threat of death or serious physical injury". He stated that Brooks was "running away at the time that the shot was fired."
On Wednesday, June 17, Howard stated, "We have also concluded that Rolfe was aware that the Taser in Brooks’ possession, it was fired twice, and once it’s fired twice it presented no danger to him or to any other persons."
The Georgia Bureau of Investigation released a statement and said that it was "not aware of today’s press conference before it was conducted" and the investigators were not "consulted on the charges filed by the District Attorney."
The statement read, "Despite today’s occurrence, the GBI will complete its mission of completing an impartial and thorough investigation of this incident and we will submit the file, once completed, to the Fulton County District Attorney’s Office."
We had earlier shared that Brooks' wife Tomika Miller previously said she wants both officers involved in the killing to go to jail. "I want them to deal with the same thing as if it was my husband who killed someone else. If it was my husband who shot them, he would be in jail. He would be doing a life sentence. They need to be put away," she said.