Body-worn and dashboard camera footage released by a Georgia sheriff’s office on Wednesday shows what led up to the moment a deputy fatally shot a black man who had been in prison for more than 16 years on a wrongful conviction.
The video released by the Camden County Sheriff’s Office captured the fatal encounter between an unnamed deputy and 53-year-old Leonard Cure during a traffic stop Monday.
The officer had pulled Cure, who was released from prison about three and a half years ago, for speeding on Interstate 95 — claiming he passed him “doing 100 miles an hour,” according to the clip.
The video shows Cure pulling his pickup truck to the side of the highway followed by deputies yelling at him to get out of the vehicle.
“Get out! Put your hands back here,” he ordered Cure pointing to the back of the pickup truck.
“I didn’t do s–t,” Cure replied throwing her arms back as the officer tried to grab her.
The deputy pulled out his Taser and pointed it at him while ordering Cure to step into the back of the vehicle.
Leonard Cure, 53, was shot and killed by a Georgia deputy during a traffic stop Monday.AP
Solve the question of who the deputy is and what law enforcement agency he works with.
He then raised his hands in the air as he walked to the back of the truck and followed the deputy’s instructions to put his hands on the back and turn around.
“Put your hands behind your back,” the deputy then instructed Cure after calling for backup.
Confused, Cure asks if there is a warrant for his arrest and leaves his hands on the truck.
“Either put your hands behind your back because you’re getting dirty, I’m telling you now,” the officer told Cure.
“Why? Why am I tempted?” Cure asked.
“Because you were pulled over for speeding and reckless driving,” the deputy said.
“I don’t drive. No one was injured. How do I drive fast?”
“You passed me doing 100 miles an hour,” the deputy said.
“OK, so that’s a speeding ticket, right?” Cure asked.
“Sir, a ticket in the state of Georgia is a felony,” the officer replied.
Cure, in disbelief, says he won’t go to jail and refuses to comply.
“Your back hand. Yeah, you’re going to jail,” the deputy said and then snickered at Cure in the back after Cure pointed to the sky.
Cure’s family says the traffic stop should not have caused his death.AP
The deputy again yelled at Cure to put his hands behind his back, but instead, Cure spread his hands on the tazer strap and approached the deputy.
The pair then wrestled chest to chest, dash cam video shows. Cure grabbed the officer’s face and pushed his head back, cursing him, while the officer pulled out his baton and hit him, according to the recording.
The deputy then shot Cure with his gun at close range and the man released his face as he fell to the ground, the clip shows.
“Stay down,” he yelled at Cure as he ran around, according to the video.
A panting deputy spoke on his radio and reported that shots were fired and the suspect fell while calling for help.
He and other officers who arrived at the scene rendered aid until paramedics arrived and moved Cure into an ambulance, according to a video that later showed the deputy becoming emotional and crying.
The cure then dies.
Cure was acquitted in 2020 of an armed robbery conviction more than 16 years earlier. Florida Channel
Her family — who were shown the video before it was made public — said the traffic stop should not have ended with Cure’s death.
His brother Wallace Cure told reporters that “there was absolutely no reason why my brother was killed for a traffic stop.” While he acknowledged the physical altercation captured on video, he said he has seen other confrontations between police and suspects where “the person didn’t end up dead.”
Family attorney Benjamin Crump said the deputy appeared aggressive from the start and made no effort to defuse the situation.
Crump and another relative, Michael Cure, believe the officer triggered Cure when he told him he was going to jail.
“I believe there may be some issues going on, some mental issues with my brother,” Michael Cure said. “I know him well. The officer just triggered it, no doubt triggered it. It was excitement met with excitement.”
Crump said Cure’s post-traumatic stress disorder was triggered.
“When you’ve been wrongfully convicted, and then they’re talking about putting you back in the cage?” he said at a press conference with his brother. “It’s psychological at that point.”
Body- and dash-cam footage showed Cure fighting with the deputy before he was shot. via REUTERS
Cure was released and released in 2020 through the work of the Innocence Project of Florida.
He is serving a life sentence after he was convicted in 2003 of the armed robbery of a Walgreens in Broward County, FL.
But the Broward State Attorney’s Office’s Conviction Review Unit was established in 2019 and took on his case. The unit found that Cure had a strong alibi — in the form of a time-stamped ATM receipt miles away — at the time of the robbery, which had previously been ignored, and no physical evidence to tie him to the scene.
An independent review panel of lawyers and later a judge all agreed that Cure was innocent and the charges were dropped.
“I can’t wait to put this situation behind me and move on with my life,” Cure told the South Florida Sun Sentinel at the time.
The freed man recently bought a house in Palmetto, Ga. with a portion of the $817,000 he received from the state of Florida this summer for his wrongful conviction and incarceration.
Executive director of The Innocence Project of Florida, Seth Miller, mourns the death of Cure aka Lenny.
“I can only imagine what it’s like to know your son is innocent and to see him sentenced to life in prison, released and … then told that as soon as he was released, he was shot dead,” Miller said.
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