Spotsylvania Deputy Appears To Mistake Cordless Phone For Gun

SPOTSYLVANIA COUNTY, VA — A Virginia deputy who apparently mistook a cordless house phone that a Spotsylvania County man was holding for a gun shot the man seven times last Wednesday, according to police reports.

Isaiah Brown, a 32-year-old Black man, was walking down the street away from his house in Spotsylvania County and was on the phone with a 911 dispatcher when the sheriff's deputy arrived following reports of a "domestic incident," according to a police statement, as well as body camera footage and 911 audio.

At the request of Spotsylvania Sheriff Roger Harris, the Virginia State Police began an investigation into the incident. Fredericksburg Commonwealth’s Attorney LaBravia Jenkins has been appointed as special prosecutor and will decide what, if any, action will be taken against the unnamed deputy, who is white.

Harris released a video statement Friday night in which he said the special prosecutor advised his office to release the audio recording of the 911 call and the body camera footage of the deputy who shot Brown.

The Spotsylvania Sheriff's deputy, whose name has not been released, appeared to mistake the cordless telephone for a gun. The deputy shot Brown at least seven times. Brown is now in intensive care at Mary Washington Hospital in Fredericksburg.

Brown clearly told the 911 dispatcher around 3:15 a.m. on April 21 that he did not have a gun or any other weapon more than 90 seconds before the deputy arrived and shot him.

When a deputy arrives at the scene with Brown walking down the middle of the road, the deputy immediately begins yelling at him to “show me your hands.” This deputy reportedly is the same deputy who gave Brown a ride home about an hour earlier from a gas station after his car broke down.

The deputy then starts yelling to “drop the gun” even though Brown was not holding a gun. The deputy then again mistakes a phone for a gun when he says “he’s got a gun to his head.”

While Brown is holding the phone to his head speaking to the 911 dispatcher, the deputy shoots him seven times.

Brown reportedly made the 911 call because his brother would not let him go retrieve his car.

When the 911 dispatcher tells Brown that his car was towed, Brown responds, “So it is in the backyard?”

Brown then asks his brother to give him a gun. His brother responds, “No … What the [expletive] you need my gun for.”

Brown then tells the 911 dispatcher that he’s going to kill is brother. The dispatcher asks him, “Why would you say something like that?”

He responds: “Because I need to get to my sh*t.”

Brown then told the dispatcher he did not have a gun and was not armed. He told the dispatcher that he was walking down the road, where the deputy met him and shot him seven times.

A body camera video that accompanied the released 911 call does not provide much information. Brown does not show up in the blurry video until he was already on the ground after being shot.

David Haynes, an attorney with The Cochran Firm in Washington, D.C., who is representing Brown, released a statement in which he said the deputy was 50 feet from Brown when he shot him and was never threatened.

“The officer mistook a cordless house phone for a gun,” Haynes said. “There is no indication that Isaiah did anything other than comply with dispatch’s orders and raised his hands with the phone in his hand as instructed.”

At a news conference Monday, Haynes said the deputy "certainly should have been notified" by the dispatcher that Brown had said he was unarmed. It was "a failure of communication," he said.

Yolanda Brown, Brown's sister, said at the news conference that Brown works as a home health aide.

The National Black Justice Coalition, a civil rights group for Black LGBTQ people, said in a statement Monday that Brown's "Black and gay/same gender loving identity will likely make it more difficult for his family to attain accountability for the officer responsible."

“We echo the Brown family’s demands that all audio recordings associated with this shooting be released to the public," said David Johns, executive director of the National Black Justice Coalition. "Additionally, that the police officer in question, who made careless and basic errors while violating police protocols, should be held accountable."

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