A former Florida sheriff’s deputy accused of killing a Black senior U.S. Air Force airman who was pointing a gun at the ground when he opened his apartment door was arrested Monday, authorities said.
Former Okaloosa County Sheriff Eddie Duran, 38, has been indicted on one count of negligent homicide with a firearm in the May 3 shooting death of 23-year-old Roger Fortson, Assistant State Attorney Greg Marcil announced Friday. The charge is a first-degree felony punishable by up to 30 years in prison.
Duran was booked into the county jail on Monday, records show. Marcil confirmed Duran’s arrest to The Associated Press.
“He has in fact turned himself in,” Marcil said in a phone interview, adding that Duran’s first court appearance will be via video link on Tuesday morning. “He will remain in custody until his first court appearance.”
Florida deputy fires black airman after shooting at home, says shooting was “objectively unreasonable”
FILE – Shante Mekki Fortson, the mother of slain U.S. Air Force Senior Airman Roger Fortson, holds a photo of her son during a news conference with attorney Ben Crump, Monday, June 3, 2024, in Atlanta. (AP Photo/Bryn Anderson, File)
An attorney representing Duran did not immediately respond to an email seeking comment.
Authorities said Duran was dispatched to Fortson’s Fort Walton Beach apartment on a domestic disturbance call that turned out to be false.
After multiple knocks, Fortson opened the door with a handgun still at his side, and Duran shot Fortson multiple times, then told him to drop the gun, authorities said.
On Friday, the day the charges were announced, candles and a framed photo of Fortson in uniform were displayed in the hallway of the apartment where he was killed.
According to an internal affairs report on the shooting, Duran told investigators that when Fortson opened the door, he saw aggression in the airman’s eyes. Duran said he fired his gun because he was “standing there thinking that I was going to get shot at any moment, that I was going to die at any moment.”
Shante Mekki Fortson, mother of slain Airman Roger Fortson (right), watches Fortson’s casket as it is carried to the cemetery with family members during a funeral service at New Birth Missionary Baptist Church in Stonecrest, Georgia, May 17, 2024. (AP Photo/Bryn Anderson, File)
Okaloosa County Sheriff Eric Aden fired Duran on May 31 after an internal investigation concluded Duran was not in danger of losing his life when he fired his gun. Outside law enforcement experts have also said officers cannot fire simply because a suspect has a gun if there is no threat.
Duran is a law enforcement veteran who began his career as a military police officer in the Army. He joined the Okaloosa County Sheriff’s Office in July 2019 but resigned after two years when his wife, a nurse, was transferred to a Naval hospital outside the area. He will return to the sheriff’s office in June 2023.
According to the Okaloosa teacher’s personnel records, he was reprimanded in 2021 for not following through on his assignment to visit the homes of three alleged sex offenders to verify their addresses and telling a colleague he didn’t care about them. He was later named assistant principal at the high school and was also disciplined that year for leaving school after the bell rang and before students had left. Florida law requires armed guards to be on campus during school hours.
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According to 911 call records, officers had never been called to Fortson’s apartment before, but they had been called to a nearby station 10 times in the past eight months, including one for a domestic disturbance.
