Georgia prosecutor in Rayshard Brooks shooting asks for case to be reassigned

The Georgia official in charge of overseeing the case against the police officer charged in the shooting and killing of Rayshard Brooks last summer in Atlanta, Ga., has asked to be removed. 

Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis sent a letter dated Monday to Georgia Attorney General Chris Carr (R) requesting that her office be removed from the case of former Atlanta Police Officer Garrett Rolfe, who has been charged with several offenses including felony murder. 

The letter comes less than a month since Willis took on the role. 

Willis also asked that her office not be responsible for the cases against six officers involved in an earlier incident in which two students at historically Black colleges were pulled from a car in downtown Atlanta during a protest against police brutality. 

In the letter, which was first reported by The Atlanta Journal-Constitution and later shared with The Hill, Willis cites concerns about the behavior of her predecessor, Paul Howard. 

“My predecessor obtained arrest warrants against the following defendants for incidents that occurred during the campaign,” Willis wrote in the letter. “I believe his conduct, including using video evidence in campaign television advertisements, may have violated Georgia Bar Rule 3.8(g).” 

“In addition, as you are aware, my predecessor’s conduct also prompted a referral to the GBI for criminal investigation by you his issuance of grand jury subpoenas at a time when no Fulton County Grand Jury was empaneled,” she continued.

Willis added in the letter that Howard’s actions “create sufficient question of the appropriateness of this office continuing to handle the investigation and possible prosecution of these cases and that the public interest is served by disqualifying this office and referring the matter to specially appointed prosecutor.”

A spokesperson for Carr’s office told The Hill that the office received the letter Thursday afternoon and it is awaiting additional information needed to initiate the process for appointing a substitute prosecutor. 

Brooks’s death occurred less than three weeks after the police killing of George Floyd, further fueling nationwide protests against police brutality and racism in the United States. 

Viral social media footage captured the June incident, in which Rolfe can be seen shooting at Brooks, striking him twice in the back in a Wendy’s parking lot as Brooks attempts to run away from officers. 

Brooks had initially been stopped after he had fallen asleep in his car in the drive-thru lane, prompting questioning and sobriety tests that escalated into violence as officers attempted to arrest Brooks. Brooks reportedly hit one of the officers, and grabbed the other’s stun gun before firing it and running away. 

After discharging his own stun gun, Rolfe then fired his handgun at Brooks.