On August 5, 2016, Jamarion Rashad Robinson, a 26-year-old African American man who had been diagnosed with paranoid schizophrenia, was shot 59 times and killed in a police raid in East Point, Georgia, a suburb of Atlanta.
Marshal Eric Heinze and Clayton County Police officer Kristopher Hutchens were criminally charged with felony murder, burglary, aggravated assault and making false statements in connection with the shooting.
[6] At the time, he also had an outstanding warrant for his arrest for allegedly pointing a gun at officers before fleeing when he was confronted at the apartment complex of a friend.
[6] His mother had told police about his recent diagnosis of paranoid schizophrenia, but they did not bring any mental health practitioners with them for the raid.
[6] According to an investigator hired by the family, the evidence showed that after killing Robinson, police handcuffed his hands behind his back, dragged his body down the stairs from the second floor to the living room on the lower level, and threw a flash-bang grenade into the area after the shooting in an apparent attempt to confuse the investigation of the scene.
[6] Paul Howard, the District Attorney of Fulton County, agreed, saying "If we had body cams, a lot of the issues that have been raised about that case would go away.
[3][21] The suit claimed the officers had "conspired among and between themselves to unreasonably stop, seize, shoot and injure Jamarion Robinson in violation of his Constitutional rights, to destroy and fabricate evidence, to complete false, inaccurate and misleading reports, and to make false statements to superior officers in order to conceal their wrongdoing.
[1][2] He said that federal authorities had prevented his prosecutors from interviewing the officers who were involved in the shooting and had refused to turn over any documents relating to the case.
[2] In January 2019, after the Department of Justice raised procedural objections, Howard withdrew subpoenas to interview some of the officers involved in the shooting, which he said was in a "spirit of cooperation" with the agency.
[needs update] Robinson's mother said "Paul Howard has failed my family and has not tried to indict the officers who murdered my son even though he's been promising me he's going to take action for nearly four years.
The first was in 2021 with the judge saying the officers' "use of force was objectively reasonable" and their actions were covered by the doctrine of "qualified immunity", but that was appealed and overturned.
[17] In August 2022, the 11th Circuit Court of Appeals ruled in favor of Monteria Robinson for potential liability for officer Eric Heinze, citing the video and audio recording as evidence of a "genuine dispute of material fact", since the sound captured three bursts of automatic gunfire after the grenade explosion, which contradicted the testimony of Heinze, since he had said he stopped firing after the grenade went off.
[17] On October 27, 2021, a grand jury indicted law enforcement officers Eric Heinze and Kristopher Hutchens[24] on charges of felony murder, burglary, aggravated assault and making false statements in connection with the shooting.
[12] Heinze was a U.S. deputy marshal at the time of the shooting, and Hutchens was a police officer, and they were members of the fugitive task force executing the arrest warrant for Robinson.
A hearing on the two officers' immunity claims concluded on June 22, 2023, with U.S. District Judge Victoria Marie Calvert presiding.
[7] Members of the New Black Panther Party organized and marched in honor of African-American individuals shot and killed by police in recent years.
[8] Students at the Atlanta University Center used the hashtag #AUCShutItDown to voice support of Robinson's family and draw attention to his death.