ELIZABETH CITY, N.C. (WAVY) – 10 On Your Side obtained video exclusively on Tuesday, which shows Pasquotank County deputies arriving outside Andrew Brown Jr.’s home to serve a search warrant last week.
The video was obtained through a FOIA request. It is not the deputy body camera video. Officials have yet to release that to the public. Some of Brown’s family members and lawyers were allowed to privately view 20 seconds of body camera footage from one deputy’s camera on Monday afternoon, though.
In the city-owned video, Elizabeth City Police Chief Eddie Buffalo provided to WAVY News 10, you can see deputies arriving in the back of a pickup truck on Wednesday, April 21. The city camera is mounted on a utility pole along Brown’s street.
The truck turns toward Brown’s driveway. You can hear deputies yell, “Get your hands up.”
The video begins to glitch at this point and audio drops out for about 20 seconds. This is reportedly when the gunfire is taking place. Buffalo told WAVY News the loud sounds caused the camera to glitch.
What you can’t see is what Brown’s attorneys described after they watched the body camera footage. They said the deputies jumped out and surrounded Brown’s car. At some point, they started shooting. Brown was in his car with his hands on the steering wheel, according to the family. Brown was shot four times in the right arm and then once in the back of the head, a private autopsy released by the family shows.
BELOW: Watch the city footage.
Pasquotank County Sheriff Tommy Wooten released this statement Tuesday afternoon:
“I want answers about what happened as much as the public does. The private autopsy released by the family is important and I continue to pray for them during this difficult time. However, a private autopsy is just one piece of the puzzle. The independent investigation being performed by the SBI is crucial and the interviews, forensics, and other evidence they gather will help ensure that justice is accomplished.”
The family still wants to see all of the body camera video. The media, including WAVY-TV 10, will be in court on Wednesday asking for the video to be released.
Elizabeth City implemented a curfew from 8 p.m. until 6 a.m., beginning Tuesday night. The curfew will stay in effect until further notice, officials say. The only exceptions are for traveling to and from employment and emergencies.
After WAVY-TV 10 obtained the video from the street, national civil rights attorney Ben Crump and other attorneys involved in the case, including Bakari Sellers, Harry Daniels, and Chantel Cherry-Lassiter, released a statement about both the video and the launch of an investigation into the case by the FBI.
“We have just been informed that the FBI will launch its own federal investigation into the murder of Andrew Brown Jr. We have great faith that this caliber of an investigation will prevent any obscuring of the facts released to the Brown family and public, and will overcome any local bias that may prevent justice from being served.
“We have just been informed that the FBI will launch its own federal investigation into the murder of Andrew Brown Jr. We have great faith that this caliber of an investigation will prevent any obscuring of the facts released to the Brown family and public, and will overcome any local bias that may prevent justice from being served.
“The video leaked earlier today shows what we already suspected: Andrew Brown Jr. was brought down by an inflamed modern-day lynch mob. The footage shows an eerie resemblance to what we saw in Ahmaud Arbery’s modern-day lynching, except these were no vigilantes – these murderers were on the clock as law enforcement. We believe that once the long-awaited body camera footage is released, we will be able to fill in the gaps to this story and hold the officers responsible for Andrew Brown’s death accountable. The longer law enforcement waits to release the body camera footage to the Brown family and the public, the more our suspicions are raised. This leaked footage hints as to why.”
