Lawyer says an Alabama teen who was killed by police was shot in the back
Authorities have not released police body camera video of the June 23 encounter or disclosed the name of the officer who shot 18-year-old Jabari Peoples in the parking lot of a soccer field in the affluent Birmingham suburb of Homewood. They also haven't released the findings of the county's official autopsy.
Civil rights attorney Ben Crump, who is representing Peoples' family, said at a news conference that a private medical examiner from Georgia who conducted an autopsy on the family's behalf found that the teen had been shot in the back and that there was no exit wound. Without the bullet and body camera footage that captured the shooting, Crump said that the preliminary autopsy was inconclusive.
'This family is grasping at straws trying to get the answers. And it is not fair, it is not right and it is not just,' said Crump, who declined to name the medical examiner.
Police said the officer approached Peoples after smelling marijuana and shot the teen after Peoples reached for a gun while they were scuffling. A friend of Peoples who was there contradicted the police account, saying Peoples didn't have a gun.
Police said the officer's body camera 'clearly captured' the details surrounding the shooting, but the Alabama Law Enforcement Agency hasn't released the footage, citing the ongoing investigation. A 2023 state law that governs release of police recordings says an agency may choose to not disclose the recording if it would affect an active law enforcement investigation.
Homewood Mayor Alex Wyatt urged the state agency to release the footage on Monday, saying he didn't have the authority to do so as mayor.
The family's attorneys criticized the mayor, saying he is legally allowed to watch the video and tell the public what he saw, or release official police incident reports detailing the events that led up to the shooting.
'Just show us what happened to our child, please," the teen's father, William Peoples, said at the news conference.
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The Independent
an hour ago
- The Independent
Former US soldier suspected of killing 4 in Montana remains at large
The former U.S. soldier suspected of killing four people at a Montana bar was still at large early Sunday and may be armed after escaping in a stolen vehicle containing clothes and camping gear, officials said. Authorities believe 45-year-old Michael Paul Brown killed four people on Friday morning at The Owl Bar in Anaconda, Montana, about 75 miles (120 kilometers) southeast of Missoula in a valley hemmed in by mountains. Montana Attorney General Austin Knudsen said at a press conference Sunday that Brown committed the shooting with a rifle that law enforcement believes was his personal weapon. All the victims were adults between 50 and 70 years old. One of the victims was the bartender. Knudsen warned residents in the town of just over 9,000 people that Brown, who lived next door to the bar where he was a regular, could come back to the area. 'This is an unstable individual who walked in and murdered four people in cold blood for no reason whatsoever. So there absolutely is concern for the public,' Knudsen said. Numerous public events were canceled over the weekend as the search entered its third day, according to local Facebook pages. Investigators are considering all possible options for Brown's whereabouts, the attorney general said. That includes searching the woods where Brown hunted and camped while he was a kid. But Knudsen noted that, during peak tourist season in western Montana, some law enforcement officials would have to return to their local jurisdictions for their regular responsibilities. Brown served in the Army as an armor crewman from 2001 to 2005 and deployed to Iraq from early 2004 until March 2005, according to Lt. Col. Ruth Castro, an Army spokesperson. Brown was in the Montana National Guard from 2006 to March 2009, Castro said, and left military service at the rank of sergeant. Brown's niece, Clare Boyle, told the AP her uncle has struggled with mental illness for years and she and other family members repeatedly sought help. 'This isn't just a drunk/high man going wild,' she said in a Facebook message. 'It's a sick man who doesn't know who he is sometimes and frequently doesn't know where or when he is either.' Knudsen said on Sunday that Brown was 'known' to local law enforcement before the shooting. It was widely believed that he knew at least some of the victims, given how close he lived to the bar. Law enforcement released a photograph of Brown from surveillance footage taken shortly after the fatal shootings. He appeared to be barefoot and in minimal clothing. But law enforcement now believes Brown ditched the vehicle he escaped in and stole a different one that had camping gear, shoes and clothes in it — leaving open the possibility that Brown is now clothed. The last time that law enforcement saw Brown was on Friday afternoon, but there was 'some confusion' because there were multiple white vehicles involved, Knudsen said. There is a $7,500 reward for any information that leads to Brown's capture. 'This is still Montana. Montanans know how to take care of themselves. But please, if you have any sightings, call 911,' Knudsen said.
The Guardian
an hour ago
- The Guardian
I wallowed in booze for four decades. Here's what five sober years have taught me
Everyone needs a hobby, and for 40 years mine was booze. I was 17 when I drank enough to throw up for the first time, and 57 when I stopped. In between I spent most nights, and thousands of lunchtimes and afternoons, with at least a gentle buzz on. One cheeky pint would turn into three, four, a binge. I blacked out. I had fumbling, regrettable sex. I vomited out of cars and on to lawns. I drank wine at 50p a bottle and £15 a glass – and a sea of lager, lager, lager. There was vodka flavoured with everything, from raspberries to rhubarb and bacon, plus gin and armagnac and amaretto and tequila and eggnog and crème de menthe and Baileys and sherry and blue curaçao and bourbon and cider and Kahlúa. Some evenings I would laugh and laugh and laugh; other times drinking felt more like a grim duty. I talked bollocks, I slurred my words, I lost the ability to speak, I had drunken arguments. I stole a huge block of cheese, a library book, a punt, a traffic cone. (I was arrested for the last one, and when I was being cautioned the officer said I seemed like a bright lad, and had I considered a career in the police?) I slept terribly, waking to a splitting head and a sweaty fear of what I might have got up to. All this again and again and again and again. Account for inflation, and I spent hundreds of thousands of pounds on drinks I didn't particularly enjoy, meals I didn't need, clubs, taxis, all the crap you'd never buy if you were in your right mind. That's the price of a house down the drain. Most of this happened in London, when I worked in an office and there was always someone to drink with, but in my 40s I lived on my own in deepest rural France, and that wasn't much better. Drop in on a neighbour, even at 10am, and you'd be offered a tumbler of wine. My little house in the woods had a cellar, and booze flowed in and out of it like the tide: beaujolais, bordeaux, bourgogne, côtes du Rhône, corbières, corbières-boutenac; Grimbergen, Blanche de Bruxelles, Leffe Blonde, Leffe Brune, Leffe Triple … I arrived in 2003, and sat out that year's heatwave in a deckchair, drinking Pelforth in the shade of my favourite spruce, and using the bilberries that grew all around to flavour supermarket spirits. Every now and again, I would send photos of dewy glasses to friends back in Britain: look at me, I'm living the life, this stuff is practically free! My home was in the mountains, on the side that caught the storms. On summer nights lightning would hit the power lines, plunging the house into darkness. One August, as thunder shook the forest, I sat under the tallest tree, thrilling to the flashes, knocking back the vodka and oblivious to the fact that the next bolt might be aimed at me. Most evenings, though, I would open a bottle of rasteau and sit on the terrace to enjoy the sunset. One night, polishing off a last few glasses by starlight, I spotted a man with a rifle lurking near the house – and decided it would be a good idea to chase him through the woods, while shouting that I had a gun of my own, which I didn't. Most shamefully of all, I'd been drinking with my grownup daughter, and I dragged her along with me. I didn't wrong anyone so badly that I can't look myself in the face, but there are a lot of people I ought to say sorry to. It wasn't all bad. I had some lovely drunken meals, drunken chats and drunken romances. I'm shy, and booze helped me unbend, make friends and meet women. Without it, I might never have got more than a hug from the woman who is now my wife. All the same, the more I drank, the more I tired of the crap that went with it – not just the misbehaving and the hangxiety but the knowledge that none of this was good for my health. Ask Dr Jeevan Fernando, an associate at the charity Alcohol Change UK, how booze can damage your body and he'll mention liver disease, of course, and sleep problems, and osteoporosis and drunken falls. 'But one that I worry about most is the risk of dementia and cognitive decline,' he says. 'Heavy alcohol use is very strongly related to the decline and atrophy of your brain. There is a normal shrinkage that occurs with age, but alcohol can increase that – and the risk of dementia later in life. Then there's mental health. There is very, very strong evidence of a link to increased anxiety and rates of depression.' There's more. 'Also, chronic alcohol use is related to cardiovascular issues. You have a much higher rate of heart attacks, strokes; your blood pressure is worse. Alcohol is also a known carcinogen – heavily related to breast cancer, liver cancer, bowel cancer …' By my mid-50s, I had seen one close friend drink herself to death. Had I already pushed my own luck too far? I would occasionally attempt to cut down, to have just a few drinks rather than a session, but never got very far. One mouthful was enough to get me in the zone and wash away my resolve. 'This is nice,' my mind would say. 'More will be even nicer.' As for stopping completely, that wasn't on my radar. Booze was how I switched off after a stressful day, how I put a smile on my face. How would I relax without it? How would I fill the evenings? I could hardly become Teetotal Phil if I couldn't even visualise Teetotal Phil. But then, five years ago, on 2 August 2020, I just packed it in. This may not mean much unless you're a hardened drinker, but I have got through Christmas parties sober, and office leaving dos. I have survived two wedding receptions on nothing more than alcohol-free wine and beer. Oh, and cocaine, but I never set out to give that up. Joke! I have barely touched drugs in my life, apart from the liquid, legal, socially acceptable one. I'm not about to start now. I'm not going to lie: I don't socialise as readily as I used to. Right now, as I write this, I could be at a summer drinks party with my workmates. But I know that as the evening wears on we'd drift apart, like radios that can't hold a frequency. I'd bring everyone down, the dry ghost at the feast. This is a me-problem, as other non-drinkers seem to cope. Practice would help – but, although I have never thought of myself as tight, the new me struggles with the idea of paying 30 or 40 quid for a round when I'd be knocking back Diet Coke. How have I filled the hours when I would have been drinking? I watch more TV than I used to, and fuss over our two dogs, who soak up attention like hairy sponges. And I exercise – running, yoga, Hiit, calisthenics. A class here, a workshop there. I've set up some gymnastics rings in the garden. I'm studying to be a personal trainer. I'd like to learn to juggle. I meet more people than I ever did, and I can actually remember their names afterwards. I'm happier and more stable than I used to be, and now that I have learned there are other ways to handle stress, I don't worry that some disaster will send me back to the bottle. I was struck – and inspired – by something that the personal trainer Tara LaFerrara posted on Threads last month, after the sudden death of her mother. The two had a 'tough' relationship, which left a lot to untangle. 'I could have easily drunk alcohol during this time of grief, family drama and loss,' LaFerrara wrote, 'but I have not. Not one sip of alcohol in almost 1,000 days. Proud of that.' She gave up on her first wedding anniversary, almost three years ago. 'I just realised it wasn't serving me any more,' she tells me. 'I didn't like the taste or how it made me feel during or after. Now I sleep better, have more energy, more clarity, better relationships with my friends and my partner.' How did she take her mind off her mum? 'Getting outside in nature, walks, meditation, and working out has helped more than anything else.' And drinking? 'I wasn't tempted. Sitting in this pain and really feeling your raw emotions is wild.' The wild thing about my own journey, at least to me, is not that I gave up, but how easy it was. I had – still have – the occasional wistful longing for a cold beer on a hot day, or a glass of red when I'm cooking, but that's it. I didn't need hypnosis, medication or a support group, although I am not against any of those things. I didn't feel ashamed about taking antidepressants when I needed them, or getting therapy for insomnia and anxiety. I am aware of how very lucky I have been. Cold turkey will not be right for everyone. 'If you are a very heavy drinker,' Dr Fernando warns, 'abruptly stopping may cause withdrawal symptoms, so you should speak to your GP.' All that said, and without wishing to trivialise anyone dealing with addiction, not everyone will find abstinence an uphill struggle. What helped me? Clearly – and miraculously – my dependency on alcohol was far more psychological than physical. Despite the amount I had been drinking, stopping didn't give me headaches, or jitters, or overpowering cravings. And I was lucky enough to have a good marriage, to a woman who had also drunk her fill. Hannah was the one who first decided to take a break from booze, and I just tagged along, partly to support her. She wasn't a world-class boozehound like me, but she did enjoy a drink. 'Ever since I was little,' she says, 'it has been the ultimate treat, the ultimate reward, the ultimate celebration, the ultimate commiseration.' On the downside: 'As I got older,' she says, 'my hangovers were fucking biblical.' The day after my 57th birthday, 'absolutely annihilated', she announced she was taking three months off the booze. Ten days later, when I got back from a long-planned holiday, I followed suit. When the three months were up, we both decided to carry on. 'After a while,' as Hannah puts it, 'the idea of going back becomes absurd. And you think, 'Well, I could maybe drink on special occasions' – but I don't know what occasion could possibly be special enough.' There have been no dramas, no relapses, none of that tension you'd get between a spouse who gets sloshed every night and one whose body is a temple. We're closer now than we were five years ago. The only fly in the ointment is that 10-day head start. Unless she falls off the wagon, she'll always be slightly more awesome than me. I'm trying to get over it. A survey of British drinkers last year found 48% wanted to cut down or stop entirely. It's a similar story in the US and Australia. Do I have any advice for them? Nothing that would qualify me to open a detox clinic. But I will say that even if you think you can't give up, there may come a point when you find yourself pushing at an open door. And, however much you wish you had done it before, you may not have left it too late. I've had a lot of tests in the year or so since I started writing about health, and as far as I can tell my liver, brain, heart etc are all in good shape. My teeth are yellower than I'd like, which I blame on the wine, and there are broken veins in my nose and cheeks, but that's all the obvious damage. Despite those 40 stupid years, I'm hopeful I dodged a bullet. Maybe I was staggering so much it didn't hit me.
The Independent
2 hours ago
- The Independent
Senior judges reveal regret at handing out ‘unfair' indefinite jail terms and call for scandal to be ‘put right'
Senior judges who imposed 'unfair' indefinite jail terms, which have left scores of inmates locked up for minor offences languishing in prison for decades, have revealed their regret for their part in the 'injustice'. Former High Court judge Sir John Saunders said he would apologise to offenders he handed imprisonment for public protection (IPP) jail terms, which were scrapped in 2012, but not retrospectively, leaving thousands already jailed incarcerated with no release date. Now the very judges who dished out the punishment have joined calls for the government to take urgent action to help more than 2,500 prisoners still trapped under the abolished jail term, which has been branded 'psychological torture' by the UN. Victims of the scandal, whose tragic cases have been highlighted by The Independent, include Leroy Douglas, who has served almost 20 years for stealing a mobile phone; Thomas White, 42, who set himself alight in his cell and has served 13 years for stealing a phone; and Abdullahi Suleman, 41, who is still inside 19 years after he was jailed for a laptop robbery. Sir John, 76, who served as recorder of Birmingham before he was appointed to the High Court, told The Independent that if he met an IPP prisoner he had jailed who was years over tariff, he would apologise. 'I should say I'm really sorry this has happened, it's extremely unfair,' he said. 'I didn't want to be party to unfairness. I would feel very bad about it, I would apologise to them.' He said that when the sentence was introduced in 2005 by New Labour in a bid to be tough on crime, it appeared there was a 'certain degree of sense' to plans to ensure offenders completed rehabilitation courses before they were approved for release by the Parole Board. But judges had no idea those prisoners would find themselves trapped in prison indefinitely, often without access to the courses they needed to be released. He added: 'I think the essence of the job of a judge is to be fair. And we really do all try to do that. So when we conduct criminal trials, we attempt to be fair. In passing sentences, we attempt to be fair. 'If we have been party to something which has been accepted by everybody as unfair and we have been part of it… it's a bit of an affront to the job.' He and Simon Tonking, the former recorder of Stafford, have lobbied prisons minister Lord James Timpson to help those still trapped under the jail term. Both have backed a package of proposals put forward by an expert panel convened by the Howard League for Penal Reform, calling for IPP prisoners to be given a release date within a two-year window at their next parole hearing. Mr Tonking recalled imposing an IPP sentence with a minimum tariff of just six months for a relatively minor offence after a man was caught following a woman in an alley. 'Now I wonder what happened to him,' he told The Independent. 'He was in his late twenties. For all I know, he may still be there [in prison]. 'And when I look back at that case, I think I should have tried harder not to impose it.' Although he was doing his best to administer the laws in place at the time, he is now determined to be part of the solution. 'I don't feel guilty, but I do feel, having been part of that, I should be doing all I can to put what has turned out to be an injustice right,' he added. 'And I am driven in part by the fact that I was part of the administration of justice at a time when these sentences were being passed. 'I have been a part of the system that is wrong. I feel that I ought to be part of the system to put it right.' Successive governments have resisted calls to resentence IPP prisoners, claiming they cannot risk letting prisoners out until they have passed the Parole Board's release test. However, at least 94 inmates have taken their own lives in custody after losing hope of being freed, according to campaigners, with many struggling as their mental health deteriorates in prison. Mr Tonking urged the Labour government to use its majority to finally end the injustice by taking up the Howard League's proposals, adding: 'Virtually everybody who has had any professional dealings with IPP knows that it's unjust and now is the time to act.' The proposed reforms also include providing a package of mental health support for released IPP prisoners and tightening up the criteria for recalling them. Currently, many find themselves hauled back to prison indefinitely for minor breaches of strict licence conditions, despite committing no further offences. Paul Glenn, who last year retired from his role as the most senior judge in Stoke-on-Trent, also backed the charity's proposals. He told The Independent: 'Nobody envisaged that 10 years after they should have been released, they would still be in custody. The injustice there is pretty obvious. 'It's undoubtedly right that we should be sentencing people for what they have done, rather than what they might do in the future.' Prisons minister Lord Timpson said: 'It is absolutely right that the IPP sentence was abolished. 'As the IPP annual report shows, we have significantly improved support for these offenders, with greater access to rehabilitation and mental health support. 'There is more work to do as we reduce the number of IPP offenders in custody, but we will only do so in a way that protects the public.'
