ELIZABETH CITY, N.C. - Wednesday night, Elizabeth City City Council members met to talk about what happened to Andrew Brown. Brown was killed after being shot while deputies served a search warrant Wednesday morning.
“We will be transparent with this situation, absolutely,” Pasquotank Co. Sheriff Tommy Wooten said during a briefing Wednesday afternoon.
“This will not be a rush to judgment,” District Attorney Andrew Womble said. “We're going to wait for that investigation, as we're duty bound to do.”
As the meeting went on inside, outside people gathered reacting to the incident and demanding answers and transparency.
“We have to demand that we have a fair, impartial investigation,” Pasquotank County NAACP President Keith Rivers said.
During the emergency meeting, city leaders met to discuss protocols related to a curfew and state of emergency; however, neither were implemented.
They also voiced their thoughts on the shooting.
“We have to let our citizens that elected us know that we stand behind them, that we stand behind the Brown family,” one council member said.
“The family and community both deserve answers, and we need to first step back and take a deep breath and get all the facts so we know what happened and how we need to address this,” another council member added.
Following the meeting, council members addressed the crowd outside before people marched towards the Public Safety Building.
“We want to make sure that we investigate it properly and not quit,” a council member said to the crowd. “We want to make sure that all the Ts are crossed and all the Is are dotted.”
“The easiest way to solve this problem is to release the video camera footage,” one council member added, referring to the body camera footage related to the shooting.
City officials have a message to the community and beyond as the investigation gets underway.
“We will not tolerate any injustice in Elizabeth City, North Carolina,” one council member told the crowd.
