*Earlier we reported that a Georgia deputy fatally shot Leonard Allan Cure at point-blank range during a traffic stop. Cure, who had been wrongfully imprisoned years ago, didn’t exactly follow commands and physically confronted the officer, according to video released Wednesday.
As NBC Miami reports, Cure, 53, was pulled over for speeding and reckless driving. A video released by the Camden County Sheriff Wednesday shows he grabbed the officer by the neck during the traffic stop on Interstate 95, just across the state line in Georgia. The family believes Cure resisted arrest due to psychological trauma from his prison stint for a crime he didn’t commit.
“I believe there were possibly some issues going on, some mental issues with my brother,” Michael Cure said of his brother.
“I know him quite well. The officer just triggered him, undoubtedly triggered him. It was excitement met with excitement,” he added.
Videos show Leonard Cure fight with Georgia deputy https://t.co/ba4vFaLezt
— Ben Crump (@AttorneyCrump) October 19, 2023
In the police dashcam video (see the YouTube clip above), the white deputy is heard telling Cure, “You passed me going 100 miles per hour.”
“I’m not going to jail,” Cure says at one point. The deputy responds, “Yes, you are going to jail.”
Cure is repeatedly told by the deputy to put his hands behind his back or he will be tased. In response to his refusal to comply, the deputy tases him.
In the process of being tased, Cure grabs the Taser wire and the two engage in a physical struggle. Cure grabs the deputy’s throat and pushes his head back. The deputy strikes Cure multiple times with a baton before firing his weapon. The video shows Cure falling to the ground.
“He and his family deserved better,” the Innocence Project of Florida said in a statement, CNN reports. “Lenny’s life mattered.”
Cure was initially sentenced to serve a life sentence for armed robbery in Broward County, Florida, but was exonerated and released in April 2020. In August, a compensation of $817,000 was paid to him for his wrongful conviction.
“He came home and I was over the moon because I thought that he was finally free,” Cure’s mother, Mary, told reporters at a news conference on Wednesday, per CNN. “My baby was free. But the truth of the matter is that he never came home.”
His family said Cure lived in constant fear of being incarcerated again.
“He really should be alive,” Michael Cure said. “The officer hit him with his baton and he tased him, twice as a matter of fact. But he did not have to shoot him.”
Civil rights attorney Ben Crump has been hired to represent the family.
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