Family of exonerated man killed by Georgia deputy at traffic stop files lawsuit

The family of a Georgia man killed by a sheriff’s deputy in October, three years after he was exonerated and freed from prison, has filed a federal lawsuit against the sheriff’s office and the deputy.

Leonard Cure’s family and their attorneys filed a federal lawsuit on Tuesday, naming Buck Aldridge, the Camden County Sheriff’s Office deputy who fatally shot Cure, and Sheriff Jim Proctor. Along with seeking monetary damages, the suit claims that Aldridge and Proctor violated Cure’s Fourth Amendment rights when Aldridge stopped Cure and ultimately killed him on Oct. 16, during a traffic stop on Interstate 95 near the Georgia-Florida border, said Harry Daniels, one of the family’s attorneys.

The family is seeking $16 million — $1 million for every year Leonard Cure was wrongfully incarcerated for armed robbery. His death came after he was freed from a 16-year prison sentence for a crime he didn’t commit.

“All I really want is justice for my brother,” Michael Cure said in a news conference on Tuesday. “Unfortunately, it has to be financial compensation. But my brother deserves better than what he received in Camden County.” He added of Cure: “He was 100% exonerated. He was innocent. Only to be out three years and have an encounter with this racist, incompetent officer who took his life unnecessarily. Where’s the justice?”

Daniels cited repeated documented instances of Aldridge’s excessive use of force in the past. In 2022, he dragged a driver from a crashed car and punched him after the man fled from Aldridge on Interstate 95, according to The Associated Press, which noted that records indicated Aldridge faced no disciplinary action. The AP relied on body and dashcam footage to detail the incident.  In 2017, Aldridge was fired by the Kingsland Police Department for throwing a woman to the ground during a traffic stop and handcuffing her, the AP reported. That termination came after two previous unnecessary force violations, the AP reported. Aldridge was hired by the Camden County Sheriff’s Office in 2018, according to the AP.

“Buck Aldridge has a history of violence and unlawful use of force while in uniform,” Daniels said Tuesday, noting that Proctor, the sheriff, overlooked Aldridge’s history. “The reason why Buck Aldridge got out the car, ready to inflict harm, because his sheriff Jim Proctor allowed it to happen.”

Daniels said the lawsuit holds Proctor just as responsible for Cure’s death as Aldridge. “This is not just a bad apple, it’s a bad orchard. And today we are bringing accountability to the apple and the orchard,” he said.

Neither the Camden County Sheriff’s Office nor Aldridge’s attorney, Adrienne Browning, immediately responded to a request for comment from NBC News. Browning has said in the past that Aldridge is a “fine officer” and shot Cure because he feared for his life.

Cure, 53, had been visiting his mother, Mary Cure, in Port St. Lucie, Florida, and was returning to his metro Atlanta home when Aldridge pulled him over for speeding. In the days following the killing, Camden County Sheriff’s Office released dashboard and body camera video showing the deputy pulling Cure over and ordering him to put his hands on the back of his pick-up truck and then behind his back. Cure appeared to comply until he learned that the deputy intended to arrest him for speeding and reckless driving, according to the Georgia Bureau of Investigation and the sheriff’s office.

The deputy fired a stun gun at Cure and a fight ensued, with Cure grabbing the deputy by the neck and pushing his head backward, the video shows. The deputy shot the stun gun twice at Cure and hit him with a baton before shooting him with a gun at point-blank range.

“When they want to use excess force, you have other parts of the body you can shoot. You don’t always have to kill somebody,” Mary Cure said Tuesday. “It’s a terrible day when the citizens have to police the police.”

In 2020, Cure was the first person exonerated by Broward County’s Conviction Review Unit. He’d been wrongfully convicted of armed robbery and sentenced to life in prison in 2004. He was freed three years ago, after the Innocence Project of Florida convinced authorities to review the case. It was determined, through examining an ATM receipt and other evidence, that Cure could not have been involved in the act because he was miles away when the robbery occurred. The Broward County prosecutor’s office concluded that Cure did not commit the crime.

After his release, Cure held down a job, reconnected with his family and was in the process of buying a home when he was killed, according to the Innocence Project. His mother said on Tuesday that she used the compensation Cure received from the state for his wrongful conviction and imprisonment to bury him.

“You know how painful that is?” she said. “He never got to spend anything. Bought a house, he was never, ever to live in it. The hell of trying to close out his estate, and being questioned by the officials in Georgia, has been daunting.”

Cure’s family said in October that his time behind bars likely played a role in the deadly altercation. And Michael said then his brother may have had mental health issues. Seth Miller, executive director of the Innocence Project of Florida, agreed, saying that the psychological trauma of being unjustly incarcerated may have led Cure to intensely fear a new arrest.

“He, like many of my other clients, their biggest fear is that at a moment’s notice there’s going to be law enforcement on the other side of that front door or at a traffic stop who is going to — without cause, for something they didn’t do — send them back right where they worked so hard to get out of,” Miller said then, adding, “I can only imagine that must’ve been what he was thinking during this traffic stop.”

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