A Georgia sheriff’s deputy involved in the fatal shooting of a man during a 2023 traffic stop that turned violent will not face criminal charges.
Leonard Cure, 53, was killed only three years after being exonerated for a crime he did not commit following a 16-year sentence.
The district attorney who examined the body camera footage believes the footage shows Staff Sgt. Buck Aldridge shock Cure with a Taser after he refused to put his hands behind him to be handcuffed. Cure then fights back and puts his hand at the deputy’s throat before Aldridge shoots him point-blank.
FAMILY OF EXONERATED BLACK MAN KILLED BY GEORGIA DEPUTY IS SUING DEPUTY, SHERIFF
“Use of deadly force at that point was objectively reasonable given that he was being overpowered at that time,” District Attorney Keith Higgins told The Associated Press.
Higgins says he told Cure’s family of his decision during a meeting Monday and that he has also notified Aldridge.
The attorneys for Cure’s family still insist Aldridge used excessive force.
“This decision is a devastating failure of justice, sending the message that law enforcement officers can take a life without consequence,” family attorneys Ben Crump and Harry Daniels said in a statement.
Cure’s relatives have attributed his attempt to resist to psychological trauma from being imprisoned in Florida for an armed robbery he did not commit.
Lawyers for Cure’s family say that Aldridge should never have been hired after he was fired by the neighboring Kingsland Police Department in 2017. Aldridge was on a third discipline for using excessive force. He was hired nine months later, according to personnel records.
Video from a June 2022 pursuit shows Aldridge punching a driver who is on his back as he pulls the driver from a wrecked car. No disciplinary actions were taken against the deputy in that incident, records show.
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Cure’s family filed a federal lawsuit against Aldridge and then-Sheriff Jim Proctor in U.S. District Court, seeking $16 million.
The lawsuit accused Aldridge of using excessive force and Proctor of ignoring the deputy’s history of violence.
The case is still pending in U.S. District Court.
