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The Times, Gainesville, Georgia | gainesvilletimes.com
Sunday, November 25, 2018 3A
Man killed by officer at
Ala. mall was not shooter
200 people protest death of black man shot by police in error
A police officer speaks to a woman after gunfire erupted Thanksgiving night at the Riverchase
Galleria in Hoover, Ala. Police responding to a fight inside the shopping mall shot and killed a man
who had brandished a weapon, authorities said Friday.
Associated Press
HOOVER, Ala. — Protest
ers on Saturday marched
through an Alabama shopping
mall where police killed a
black man they later acknowl
edged was not the triggerman
in a Thanksgiving night shoot
ing that wounded two people.
An officer shot and killed
21-year-old Emantic Fitzger
ald Bradford, Jr. of Huey-
town while responding to
the Thursday mall shooting.
Police said Bradford was flee
ing the scene with a weapon.
Hoover Police initially told
reporters Bradford had shot
a teen at the mall, but later
retracted the statement.
“We knew that was false,”
said stepmother Cynthia
Bradford when she heard
police were blaming him for
the shooting. She described
her stepson, who went by
E.J., as a respectful young
man who is the son of a Bir
mingham police department
officer.
Hoover Police Captain
Gregg Rector said investiga
tors now believe more than
two people were involved in
the initial fight ahead of the
shooting, and that “at least
one gunman” is still at large
who could be responsible.
Rector said police regret that
their initial statement about
Bradford was not accurate.
More than 200 demonstra
tors, including several rela
tives, chanted “E.J” and “no
justice, no peace” as they
marched past Christmas shop
pers at the mall. They held a
moment of silence at the spot
outside a shoe store where
Bradford was killed.
“They should have never
have killed him,” Emani
Smith, 7, Bradford’s half-sis
ter said, while other family
members cried.
Family members described
their horror of finding out
from social media that Brad
ford was dead. Video cir
culated on social media of
Bradford lying in a pool of
blood on the mall floor.
The incident began Thanks
giving night with a fight and
shooting in suburban Bir
mingham at the Riverchase
Galleria, a mall crowded with
Black Friday bargain hunters.
An 18-year-old was shot twice
and a 12-year-old bystander
was shot in the back.
Police said while Bradford
“may have been involved in
some aspect of the alterca
tion, he likely did not fire
the rounds that injured the
18-year-old victim.”
The Alabama Law Enforce
ment Agency is investigat
ing the incident since it is an
officer-involved shooting. The
Hoover Police Department is
conducting its own internal
investigation.
The officer who shot Brad
ford was placed on adminis
trative leave while authorities
investigate the shooting. The
officer’s name was not
released publicly. The offi
cers were not hurt.
Bradford is shown in pho
tos on Facebook in an Army
uniform and he described
himself as a combat engineer.
A spokesman for the Army,
however, told The Washing
ton Post that he “never com
pleted advanced individual
training,” and so did not
serve.
Video posted on social
media by shoppers showed a
chaotic scene as shoppers fled
the mall, which closed for the
remainder of Thursday night.
A witness, Lexi Joiner, told
Al.com she was shopping with
her mother when the gun
fire started. Joiner said she
CAROL ROBINSON I Associated Press
heard six or seven shots and
was ordered, along with some
other shoppers, into a supply
closet for cover.
“It was terrifying,” Joiner
said.
A woman who described
herself as the mother of the
injured 12-year-old posted
on social media that the girl
was on a Black Friday shop
ping trip with other family
members when the shooting
happened, and didn’t imme
diately realize that the pain
in her back was from a bullet.
“She was hurting a lot, but
very brave and positive as
always,” the mother wrote
after seeing the girl when she
arrived at a hospital.
Hoover Police said Friday
morning that the girl was in
stable condition.
Trial to begin
in deadly white
nationalist rally
Associated Press
RICHMOND, Va. — A planned “Unite the
Right” rally by white nationalists in Charlottes
ville exploded in chaos: violent brawling in the
streets, racist chants, smoke bombs, and finally,
a car speeding into a crowd of counterprotest
ers, killing one and injuring dozens more.
Afterward, President Donald Trump
enflamed racial tensions when he said “both
sides” were to blame, a com
ment some saw as a refusal to
condemn racism.
Fifteen months later, as the
man accused of driving the
car heads to trial on murder
charges, the wounds are still
raw. Few in Charlottesville
believe the trial will do much
to heal the community or the
country’s racial divide.
“Hopefully, this will signal a chance for heal
ing, although I am not entirely optimistic about
that because the entire culture in which we live
is so steeped these days in white supremacy and
white nationalism that violence is becoming
less an exception to the practice of American
democracy and more like a brutal showing of
it,” said Lisa Woolfork, a University of Virginia
professor who was in a crowd of counterprotest
ers when the car struck on Aug. 12,2017.
Heather Heyer, 32, a paralegal and civil
rights activist marching about 100 feet away
from Woolfork, was killed. The death toll rose
to three when a state police helicopter monitor
ing the event crashed, killing two troopers.
The rally was organized in part to protest
the planned removal of a statue of Confederate
Gen. Robert E. Lee. Hundreds of Ku Klux Klan
members, neo-Nazis and other white national
ists — emboldened by Trump’s election —
streamed into the college town for one of the
largest gatherings of white supremacists in a
decade. The group’s show of strength included
dressing in battle gear, shouting racial slurs and
attacking counterprotesters.
James Alex Fields Jr., a 21-year-old Ohio man
known in high school for being fascinated with
Nazism and idolizing Adolf Hitler, heads to trial
Monday in Charlottesville Circuit Court. His
attorneys declined to comment and have pro
vided no hint of what his defense will be.
Fields was photographed hours before the
attack with a shield bearing the emblem of Van
guard America, one of the hate groups that par
ticipated in the rally, although the group denied
any association with him.
Pretrial hearings have offered few insights
into Fields or his motivation. A Charlottesville
police detective testified that as he was being
detained after the car crash, Fields said he was
sorry and sobbed when he was told a woman
had been killed. Fields later told a judge he
is being treated for bipolar disorder, anxiety,
depression and ADHD.
Fields Jr.
Please Join Us!
^Ol8 Tree Lighting
Celebrations
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NGMC
Gainesville
12-3-18
7 p.m.
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NGMC
Braselton
12-6-18
7 p.m.
ohmiAf
NGMC
Barrow
12-10-18
7 p.m.
Enjoy a brief musical program,
complimentary tree seedlings,
hot cider and cookies!
2018 Love Light Chairs:
Dr. Anup & Kathy Lahiry
Auxiliary President: Ellen Toms
Love Light benefits Hospice of
Northeast Georgia Medical Center
Please donate to Love Light in honor or
memory of friends, family or loved ones.
Visit nghs.com/lovelight to donate
online or for additional information.
SYa
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4 >
presented by
The Medical Center Auxiliary
an affiliate of Northeast Georgia Medical Center
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