Tuesday, January 28, 2025
19.0°F

Judge declines to revoke ex-officer's bond over Florida trip

Associated Press | Hagadone News Network | UPDATED 4 years, 5 months AGO
by Associated Press
| August 12, 2020 2:30 PM

ATLANTA (AP) — A judge on Wednesday declined a prosecutor's request to revoke the bond for the officer who killed Rayshard Brooks, but she clarified that the conditions of his bond do not allow him to vacation out of state.

Garrett Rolfe, 27, faces 11 charges, including felony murder, in Brooks’ killing on June 12. Rolfe was granted bond June 30.

One of the conditions of his bond is that he have a curfew from 6 p.m. to 6 a.m., with exceptions for work, attorney meetings or medical visits.

Prosecutors argued that meant he was to spend each night at home in Georgia, and said his bond should be revoked because they had learned from his lawyers a day after he left that he was on vacation in Florida. His lawyers countered that the law makes a distinction between home confinement or house arrest and a curfew, and argued the state never requested that he be prohibited from traveling out of state.

Fulton County Superior Court Judge Jane Barwick wrote in an order Wednesday that the bond order intentionally didn't specify the address where he would have to stay for his safety and because she anticipated he might have to move while on bond.

She never intended for him to freely travel, observing his curfew wherever he happened to be at night, she wrote, but added that bond cannot be revoked without due process. She clarified and amended the bond order to say that Rolfe “shall live and reside at one residence within the State of Georgia.”

“While the Court is not revoking Defendant's bond at this time, the Court is more than surprised at Defendant's approach to complying with his conditions of release,” she wrote. “Defendant faces charges related to the killing of another human being, and whether he believes these charges are warranted, he was given the privilege of limited freedom while these charges pend. Should he and his attorneys have any question as to the meaning of the conditions of his bond, they should seek clarification from the Court before acting, rather than hoping for continued release after acting.”

Police body cameras showed Rolfe and another officer having a calm and respectful conversation with Brooks for more than 40 minutes after complaints that the 27-year-old Black man had fallen asleep in his car in a Wendy’s drive-thru lane on June 12.

But when officers told him he’d had too much to drink to be driving and tried to handcuff him, Brooks resisted. A struggle was caught on dash camera video. Brooks grabbed one of their Tasers and fled, firing the Taser at Rolfe as he ran away.

An autopsy found Brooks was shot twice in the back.

MORE IMPORTED STORIES

Ex-officer's lawyers say trip didn't break bond conditions
Columbia Basin Herald | Updated 4 years, 5 months ago
Former officer who shot Rayshard Brooks sues over firing
Columbia Basin Herald | Updated 4 years, 5 months ago
Ex-Atlanta officer who killed Rayshard Brooks granted bond
Columbia Basin Herald | Updated 4 years, 7 months ago

ARTICLES BY ASSOCIATED PRESS

August 18, 2021 12:03 a.m.

Hong Kong police arrest 4 from university student union

HONG KONG (AP) — Four members of a Hong Kong university student union were arrested Wednesday for allegedly advocating terrorism by paying tribute to a person who stabbed a police officer and then killed himself, police said.

July 25, 2021 12:09 a.m.

For South Sudan mothers, COVID-19 shook a fragile foundation

JUBA, South Sudan (AP) — Paska Itwari Beda knows hunger all too well. The young mother of five children — all of them under age 10 — sometimes survives on one bowl of porridge a day, and her entire family is lucky to scrape together a single daily meal, even with much of the money Beda makes cleaning offices going toward food. She goes to bed hungry in hopes her children won’t have to work or beg like many others in South Sudan, a country only a decade old and already ripped apart by civil war.

July 24, 2021 12:09 a.m.

For South Sudan mothers, COVID-19 shook a fragile foundation

JUBA, South Sudan (AP) — Paska Itwari Beda knows hunger all too well. The young mother of five children — all of them under age 10 — sometimes survives on one bowl of porridge a day, and her entire family is lucky to scrape together a single daily meal, even with much of the money Beda makes cleaning offices going toward food. She goes to bed hungry in hopes her children won’t have to work or beg like many others in South Sudan, a country only a decade old and already ripped apart by civil war.