Did Police Lie About the Fatal Shooting of a Florida Man? Sure Looks Like It

On July 31, 2013, 33-year-old Jermaine McBean walked through his Florida apartment complex with an unloaded air rifle propped on his shoulders.

Three residents who saw McBean strolling around with the rifle became concerned and called 911.

The officers who responded to the call claim that they repeatedly yelled to McBean to drop his weapon, but the man didn’t comply, and that he turned and pointed the rifle at them.

Shots were fired.

McBean fell on his back, howled in pain and said, “It was just a BB gun.”

Moments later, McBean was dead.

Nothing, the officers swore under oath, would have stopped McBean from hearing the officers screaming orders to drop the gun.

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McBean was shot by Broward County Deputy Peter Peraza. Police documents show that Peraza insisted to a homicide detective that there was nothing in McBean’s ears that would have prevented him from hearing officers ordering him to drop his rifle. The detective told the family that officers at the scene “confirmed” that, reports NBC.

But a woman who witnessed the shooting noticed something that may explain why McBean didn’t drop his gun: he had earbuds in his ears at the time of the incident.

The woman, who has not been named, is a nurse who said she also offered to provide first aid to McBean as he lay dying on the ground.

She said the police stopped her from administering aid, and she pulled out her cellphone and took a picture of McBean.

That photo was provided to NBC News by a lawyer for McBean’s family with permission. The lawyer, David Schoen, said the woman did not give the photo to police who knocked on her door afterward because she was afraid.

The photo, shown above, appears to show earbuds in McBean’s ears.

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This will likely surprise no one, but the police investigated themselves (as usual) and concluded that McBean was NOT wearing his earbuds at the time of the shooting (how convenient) and told his family that the earbuds were found in the man’s pocket at the hospital (yeah, right).

Peraza stated during a videotaped interview that McBean “Pulled the weapon up over his head and grabbed it and started to turn and point it at us. I felt like my life was threatened. I had that feeling like if I would not go home that day.”

Sound familiar?

That’s because police are trained to say they feared for their lives any time they use deadly force.

Schoen says the photo proves that police lied. The family has filed a lawsuit alleging that McBean couldn’t have heard the officer’s commands because of the earbuds.

They also say that McBean never held the BB gun in a threatening manner, a belief that is also held by several witnesses. In fact, a sheriff’s report does not say that ANY witnesses said McBean pointed the rifle at police.

Michael McCarthy, one of the witnesses who called 911, told NBC News that the rifle was on McBean’s shoulders and back and he never moved the gun from that position:

“He [McBean] couldn’t have fired that gun from the position he was in. There was no possible way of firing it and at the same time hitting something,” McCarthy said. “I kind of blame myself, because if I hadn’t called it might not have happened.”

When McCarthy called 911, he told the dispatcher that it looked like McBean was carrying a .22 caliber rifle or a pellet gun. “I will say this: He’s not like acting crazy or aggressive with it, he’s not shaking it or nothing,” he told them. “I’m not going to say he’s waving it, he’s just walking along with it.”

While on the phone with the dispatcher, McCarthy saw the police arrive on the scene.

His description of the incident is chilling:

Looking out his passenger window, he said, he could see officers corralling residents away from a pool off to the right and three officers moving in on McBean. Then he heard three shots.

“Bam. Bam. Bam,” he said.

“He [McBean] dropped to the ground, the rifle bounced off the ground and I was sitting in my truck going, ‘What the hell is this!'” he added.

“They all converged over the top of him and it looked like he was having a convulsion. You could tell he was in serious pain.”

McCarthy told police the “rifle was still on the subject’s shoulders” when the gunshots rang out, a different sheriff’s report confirms.

The disabled fisherman told NBC News he was traumatized by the incident and had trouble sleeping for a month afterward.

“His birthday would have been the end of next month and I have his picture and the death [funeral] card above the computer at my house. I think about this guy constantly,” he said.

He said he has since met McBean’s family.

“They don’t blame me,” he said. “I kind of blame myself, because if I hadn’t called it might not have happened. I would still make the call but I regretted it because I had no idea they were going to zip into this place and shoot him dead.”

McBean had two degrees from Pace University in New York and worked in information technology at a Fort Lauderdale ad agency, where he serviced the company’s computers. He wore his earbuds to listen to music and to handle service calls, according to his family. He did not have a criminal record, according to Schoen and to a search of public records.

An “active investigation” by prosecutors is still ongoing.

McBean’s family filed a wrongful death and misconduct lawsuit against the sheriff’s office several weeks ago.

When McBean’s mother, Jennifer Young, learned about the new photo evidence, she said, “They lied to me. What else have they lied about?”

His brother, Alfred McBean, said, “They could have just tackled him, or just tased him. Why shoot him three times? Criminal charges need to be filed.”

His mother agreed, reports NBC.

“He’s very missed, he was very loved and he was a loving and caring person himself,” she said. “I can’t wait to get justice for him.”