An Alabama police officer fatally shot a 21-year-old black man Thursday night who police said shot at least one person at a mall near Birmingham, turning a Thanksgiving holiday shopping scene into chaos.
But on Friday, police said evidence suggests that the man was not the gunman and that the true gunman remained at large.
Police in Alabama said an officer fatally shot a 21-year-old black man Thursday night who they said shot at least one person at a mall near Birmingham.
But on Friday police said the man actually wasn’t the gunman and the true gunman remained at large.
The Hoover Police Department said on Twitter that the man who was killed, Emantic Fitzgerald Bradford Jr., “may have been involved in some aspect” of an altercation at the Riverchase Galleria in Hoover that preceded the shooting.
But, they said, he “likely did not fire the rounds” that struck an 18-year-old man as they had originally indicated. Another victim, a 12-year-old girl, was an “innocent bystander,” police said. Both were hospitalized but their conditions Saturday were unavailable.
“We regret that our initial media release was not totally accurate, but new evidence indicates that it was not,” police said, adding that the conclusion was based on interviews with witnesses and “critical evidentiary items.”
In their initial statement Friday, police said uniformed officers who were providing security at the mall “encountered a suspect brandishing a pistol and shot him.” It was not clear whether the officers believed Bradford fired or intended to fire before he was killed.
Bradford’s mother, April Pipkins, said in an interview Saturday that Bradford was living with her near Birmingham where he had been raised. Bradford, who was better known as E.J., would not have been involved in the shooting, and might have been trying to protect other people in the mall, she said.
“That was not his character at all,” she said. “He loved life, and he loved people.”
He was licensed to carry a firearm, she said. Alabama generally does not prohibit people from carrying firearms in public, according to the Giffords Law Center to Prevent Gun Violence.
Capt. Gregg Rector, a spokesman for the Hoover Police Department, said Saturday that it would be inappropriate to answer questions about the circumstances around Bradford’s death because the Alabama Law Enforcement Agency was leading the investigation.
The Hoover Police Department is, however, conducting an internal investigation into Bradford’s killing by the officer. That officer, who has not been identified, has been put on administrative leave until the investigation is complete.
This article originally appeared in The New York Times.
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