Frustration grows in Okaloosa County following two questionable officer involved shootings
Okaloosa County community activist Debra Riley has had enough of aggressive and what she sees as racially biased policing in the place she calls home.
"I'm so tired of being tired of this," said the one-time Fort Walton Beach City Council candidate. "I can tell you the community is very frustrated. They feel it."
Riley said she and others who live in predominantly Black areas of the county, places in and around the city of Fort Walton Beach, communities known as Lovejoy, Sylvania Heights and Combs, can't help but see a racial component in the May 3 officer involved shooting death of Roger Fortson, a 23-year-old senior airman stationed at Hurlburt Field.
"They look at members of the African American community like we pose a threat to them. It's stereotyped as being a bad community. It's not. You can't come home from work, because if you drive a certain car you're being pulled over and questioned by the Sheriff's Office," she said. "Your home is supposed to be safe. It's long past time to address this issue."
Roger Fortson: Family of Florida airman killed by Okaloosa deputies demands his name be cleared
In the course of less than a year Okaloosa County Sheriff's Office deputies have been tied to two shootings involving young Black men that have not only garnered national attention, but, in the age of body-camera technology, have also left those who have borne witness asking one simple question.
"Why?"
Airman Roger Fortson shot inside his home
The most recent of the shootings, and based on its outcome the most tragic, was that of Fortson. It unfolded when a deputy responding to a domestic disturbance call knocked several times on the door of apartment 1401 of the Elan Apartment complex on Racetrack Road just outside Fort Walton Beach.
When Fortson, a young military man, honor student and by all accounts a stand up individual, finally answered the door he was holding a gun down at his side. The deputy ordered him to step back and nearly simultaneously fired several shots, striking Fortson and ultimately killing him.
By the time the officer ordered Fortson to drop his weapon the airman was lying on the floor of his home, mortally wounded and struggling to breathe. The gun itself had escaped his grasp.
"When he opened his door and saw the sheriff’s deputy, Roger had his gun pointed to the ground with one hand and held his other hand up to signal he was not going to shoot," Ben Crump, an attorney hired by the Fortson family, said after viewing video of the incident. "There is no question that the officer acted with impulse and a lack of proper training."
Though a woman who led the deputy to the apartment spoke of witnesses hearing loud vulgar yelling coming from apartment 1401 and told the officer, "It happens frequently, but this time it sounded like it was getting out of hand," investigators quickly learned in the aftermath of the shooting that Fortson was alone in his apartment.
He was speaking via FaceTime with his girlfriend, according to Crump.
The girlfriend later told Fortson's family that the airman retrieved his gun because he could not ascertain whether the person knocking aggressively at his door was actually a law enforcement officer. Originally officers were standing to the side of the door after knocking and not visible, video shows.
The as-yet unidentified officer involved in the Fortson shooting has been placed on administrative leave while the Florida Department of Law Enforcement conducts a criminal investigation. The First Judicial Circuit State Attorney's Office is also investigating the case.
The Sheriff's Office has released footage from the body camera the deputy was wearing at the time of his encounter with Fortson, but Sheriff Eric Aden has not answered specific questions about the case, referring those to FDLE.
"We are doing all we can to ensure the facts of this case are fully understood," Aden said at a press conference May 9, the same day Crump met with the media accompanied by Fortson's mother and other relatives.
"I have asked the Florida Department of Law Enforcement to handle the criminal investigation that is required under these circumstances. It is important to note that while this is a criminal investigation, no determination has been made as to whether the deputy’s actions were justified or not," Aden said. "These investigations take time, but I want to assure you that we are not hiding, covering up or taking any action that would result in a rush to judgment of Mr. Fortson or our deputy."
One objective Aden said he had in calling the press conference was to dispel misinformation that his officer had arrived at the wrong apartment door prior to the confrontation with Fortson. Another was the insinuation that the deputy had for some reason covered the apartment door's peephole to prevent Fortson from looking outside.
A fallen acorn leads to gunshots
The killing of Roger Fortson rocked a community still baffled by another shooting. This one had occurred Nov. 12 on McLaren Circle, which is close to the sprawling Green Acres subdivision, also just outside the Fort Walton Beach city limits.
Deputy Jesse Hernandez had already detained, searched and handcuffed theft suspect Marquis Jackson and placed him in his patrol car when, seemingly startled by what was later learned to have been an acorn falling onto the roof of the police unit, fired multiple rounds into his own vehicle.
The officer, who had served in the military, had apparently mistaken the noise of the acorn striking the car for a shot fired. A woman Jackson had allegedly been harassing throughout the night on the day of the shooting had provided information that the suspect owned weapons, and showed deputies a photo of an object the Sheriff's Office said resembled a silencer.
More: Falling acorn spooks Florida deputy who fired into his own car, then resigned. Watch the video
At one point as he continued to discharge his weapon and shout out that shots had been fired, Hernandez fell to the ground, yelling that he had been hit. His partner, Sgt. Beth Roberts, reacted by rushing to help, calling in a report of "shots fired, officer down" even as she too fired into the patrol car.
Jackson somehow escaped the hail of bullets unscathed. Sabu Williams, the president of the Okaloosa County branch of the NAACP, said Jackson has moved away from the area in the aftermath of the shooting incident. He has announced his intention to sue the Sheriff's Office.
An internal investigation found Hernandez had violated agency policy but not acted criminally in firing his weapon. He resigned from the Sheriff's Office in December. Roberts has been cleared of any wrongdoing in the incident.
Williams speculated that Hernandez had suffered some sort of PTSD-related episode when he heard what he mistook for a muffled gunshot. Williams said hospital personnel had informed him that at the hospital following the incident the officer was still operating under the mistaken impression he had been shot.
"I think he resigned because he thought he could be a danger to himself and others if he continued in law enforcement," Williams said.
Williams said he views tragic events like those that befell Fortson and Jackson as "not a Black thing, but a community thing," though he's keenly aware of the number of young Black men across the country who have died at the hands of law enforcement.
"I don't have any evidence to say Mr. Fortson's death had nothing to do with race, but I also don't have any evidence that it did have something to do with race," Williams said. "I do know that we all carry an unconscious bias. Maybe the officer seeing a Black man holding a gun triggered an unconscious bias. Maybe he would have reacted differently there if it had been a white man."
The Okaloosa Branch of the NAACP, along with the Florida State Conference of the NAACP, on Monday published a list of demands the groups say must be met for justice to truly be served in the Fortson case. Among the demands were a call for the U.S. Department of Justice to conduct a thorough investigation into the shooting and for all Florida police departments to commit to training officers in de-escalation techniques or other alternatives to the use of force.
Also among the demands was one that the Sheriff's Office conduct a series of "community engagements." Both Williams and Riley said they have and continue to advocate for community outreach programs that help build bonds between the Okaloosa Sheriff's Office, other law enforcement agencies and communities of color.
"There should be a partnership between the community and law enforcement. We need a better relationship, multi-cultural diversity training," said Riley, who praised a community policing initiative undertaken by the Sheriff's Office through a federal grant obtained in the late 1990s. "We want the community to be involved. We have to create some sort of bond. I will continue to pray this will get better in our community."
Where to go from here
Paul Mixon, the chairman of the Okaloosa County Commission, served in law enforcement, including with the Sheriff's Office, for 16 years prior to becoming a minister and seeking elected office. He acts now in a liaison capacity between the county and its several law enforcement agencies.
He chose not to speculate on the recent shootings or whether there are issues within the Sheriff's Office that need to be addressed.
"I really don't want to form an opinion until we have FDLE's findings back," he said, speaking of the ongoing investigation of the Fortson shooting. "I think it's safest to wait to form an opinion until we have all the facts."
Mixon added that "I do trust the sheriff we have in place" and called the agency run by Aden "a Sheriff's Office filled with integrity."
U.S. Rep. Matt Gaetz, a Fort Walton Beach resident and Florida's First District Congressman, issued a statement indicating he sees no justification for the fatal shooting of Fortson.
“The killing of Airman Roger Fortson in my community continues to be a source of deep sadness. As the investigation continues, I think one thing is clear from the body cam and should be stated unequivocally: Roger did not deserve to die. He did nothing wrong," Gaetz said. "He is an American patriot for serving in our military and should be remembered as such – with no stain on his reputation."
There was no new information available from the FDLE regarding that agency's use of force investigation of the Fortson shooting. Spokeswoman Gretl Plessinger said when that independent investigation is concluded findings will be turned over to the First Judicial Circuit State Attorney's Office. She could provide no timeframe for wrapping up the investigation.
Aden did not respond to a request for comment for this article.
"We can't be silent on this"
Dr. Cedric Alexander is a Pensacola-based law enforcement analyst and nationally recognized public safety expert who has spent 40 years as a police officer, with 25 of those in a leadership role. He has served as president of the National Organization of Black Law Enforcement Executives and was appointed in 2015 to the President’s Task Force on 21st Century Policing. He retired as Minneapolis Community Safety Commissioner in 2023.
He called the Fortson shooting "something that just should not be acceptable," particularly in light of the November incident.
"Clearly there is some reason the nation is questioning how this can happen," he said.
"The kid opens the door and the guy shot him. He asked the kid to step back and at the same time shot him. You have a situation where there is a weapon at his side and the officer never gave him the opportunity to put down the weapon," he said. "This was a service call. We live in a time where everyone has weapons. This raises the question of bad training or lack of training. There's something inherently very concerning inside that Sheriff's Office."
Alexander said it is clear to him that the investigation into the Fortson shooting must be thorough yet "move aggressively" and be conducted "so as to be seen as being fully balanced and without bias on either side."
He said he knows well the dangers inherent to police work, but also questioned why the officer who knocked on Fortson's door had his gun drawn when he did so. He suggested Aden look outside the Sheriff's Office for assistance in evaluating existing policies and procedures.
"There are questions that have to be answered before this Sheriff's Office will be able to move forward," he said. "And no matter what the findings are, I still have concerns over the Sheriff's Office, particularly with what transpired in November."
Though he wondered whether training or an "attitudinal factor" had played a role in what transpired May 3, he, like others, could not rule out that race had been a factor in the Fortson shooting.
"Certainly race comes in to play when we get to the number of police shootings we have involving Black men," he said. "I don't know what was in his mind, but I know we see this trend across America as it relates to African American men, innocent African American men."
C. Marcel Davis, pastor of the Adoration for New Beginnings Church in Pensacola, had also seen the video footage of the Fortson shooting and found it deeply troubling.
He quoted Martin Luther King Jr. in stating "In the end we will remember not the words of our enemies, but the silence of our friends."
"We can't be silent on this and not say there is a problem," he said.
Davis said he worries about the "perspective on race" some law enforcement officers have when going into a situation involving an African American male. He questioned why the officer in the video didn't speak longer with the woman at the apartment complex to find out more about what problem she believed to be ongoing in Apartment 1401, and why he went to the door with his gun drawn.
"It seems like this world is in a stressful place, and in this country there is a big push to defend yourself, and protect our Second Amendment rights," he said. "In this instance, seeing a man with a gun, the officer's response should have been 'drop your weapon and freeze,' not pow pow pow. Or when an acorn hits a car and there's an African American male in the back seat, the instant reaction shouldn't be pow pow pow."
Roger Fortson funeral, candlelight vigil, information
The body of Senior Airman Roger Fortson was returned Tuesday to his family in Georgia by the Air Force via dignified transfer.
A candlelight vigil will be held in Fortson's memory at 6 p.m., Friday at Chester Pruitt Park in Fort Walton Beach.
A wake will be held Thursday from noon until 7 p.m. at Donald Trimble Mortuary in Decatur, Georgia, and funeral services have been scheduled for 11 a.m. Friday at New Birth Missionary Baptist Church in Stonecrest, Georgia.
This article originally appeared on Pensacola News Journal: Roger Fortson Okaloosa Sheriff's Office shooting frustrates community
