OfficerBlueWashington County, GA – A grand jury indicted three former Washington County deputies on Tuesday for the Taser death of Euree Martin, 58.
Former Deputies Rhett Scott, Michael Howell, and Lee Copeland have now been charged with felony murder, involuntary manslaughter, false imprisonment, aggravated assault, simple assault, and reckless conduct, according to WMAZ. Warrants have been issued for their arrest.
The charges stem from a Jul. 7 incident when a homeowner called 911 to report Martin, who suffered from schizophrenia, as a suspicious person after he asked the homeowner for water.
Howell located Martin and wrote in his incident report that he “pulled alongside the black male with my passenger window down and asked the male subject, ‘Are you OK, and what’s your name. And he looked at me and asked, ‘Who are you?’ and he walked off … toward Sandersville.”
No other publicly available information has been released about what led to the use of force.
Cell phone video of the incident shows two deputies with Martin before one of them deploys a Taser. Martin fell to the ground and twice started shaking before he ripped the probes out. Martin then got up and started walking away.
The deputies followed Martin for a bit until a third deputy pulled up. The deputy could be seen Tasering Martin as he spun around and appeared to be break the Taser wires. The finally got him on the ground and the deputies got on top of him and handcuffed him.
No other force could be seen in the video.
Martin died on on scene of a heart attack.
The three deputies were fired in October after an investigation by Georgia Bureau of Investigation determined that the deputies had violated the department’s standard operating procedures.
You can see the video of the incident below: