🎙️ Voice is AI-generated. Inconsistencies may occur.
Members of an Atlanta police union and Georgia lawmakers called for a special prosecutor to be named in the case investigating the police shooting of Rayshard Brooks.
Congressman Doug Collins, Georgia Senate Majority Leader Mike Dugan, and members of the International Brotherhood of Police Officers held a news conference Sunday in front of the Atlanta Police Department headquarters.
Collins, a Republican, said that Fulton County District Attorney Paul Howard had been influenced by politics, race and class and called for someone to replace him.
"It is time for the district attorney of Fulton County to step aside and allow the attorney general to appoint an independent prosecutor," Collins said during the press conference. "You cannot prosecute cases until the investigation is over. You don't do it for politics. Your job is to find justice for everyone, not race, not class, not anything else."
Collins has served in the House of Representatives for Georgia's ninth congressional district since 2013. In Congress' current session, Collins serves on the U.S. House Committee on the Judiciary, where he oversees law enforcement agencies, according to his website.
"While we seek justice for George Floyd, Ahmaud Arbery, and the many lives lost, we cannot turn our backs on the majority of law enforcement officers who are simply doing their jobs and putting their lives on the line for us each and every day," Collins wrote in a statement to Newsweek.
Collins' demand comes more than a week after an Atlanta police officer shot and killed Brooks, 27, after he was found asleep in his car in a Wendy's drive-thru line.
Howard had announced June 18 that two Atlanta Police Department officers would be charged in Brooks' death, despite having not yet received official results from the Georgia Bureau of Investigation's probe into the incident. Garrett Rolfe faces 11 charges, including felony murder, while Devin Brosnan faces charges of aggravated assault and two violations of oath of office.
Rolfe was fired and Brosnan has been placed on administrative duty following the charges.
"When the facts are present in a homicide case, it is my duty as District Attorney to move forward even when the case involves a police officer," Howard wrote in a statement to Newsweek.
Howard's decision brought much criticism from the public, lawmakers and law enforcement.
"Charging an Atlanta police officer with felony murder before the completion of the GBI's investigation was a political one, not a legal one," Collins wrote in the statement.
The IBPO, the union representing Atlanta police officers, expressed their gratitude in a written statement for Collins' support.
"We do not gather today as protesters. We are not here in a picket line. Our hearts are heavy for this city," according to the statement regarding Sunday's event. "We are standing and praying with the lawmakers in humility, and thankful to have them stand with us in dignity."
In his statement to Newsweek, Howard wrote that he had been thinking of Brooks' widow Sunday, as it had been the family's first Father's Day without him.
"It would be fitting if Representative Collins and the Atlanta Police Union would at minimum pause their antics for one day to reflect upon this family and what this holiday must mean for them," Howard wrote.
Those present at Sunday's press conference called for Chris Carr, the state's attorney general, to appoint an independent prosecutor to take over the Brooks investigation.
"I'm calling on Attorney General Chris Carr to appoint an independent district attorney in the case of Rayshard Brooks to ensure Georgians have complete confidence that this case is devoid of any and all political influence," according to Collins' statement.
According to Georgia law, either a judge must disqualify a district attorney or the district attorney must disqualify themselves from a case before another prosecutor could be appointed.
In his statement, Howard told Newsweek that he would not disqualify himself from the Brooks case.
"No, I will not step aside," Howard wrote. "It is my plan to continue to charge cases based upon the facts rather than the rantings of groups or individuals whose ideals are inconsistent with the principles of justice and racial equality."
This story was updated with statements from Fulton District Attorney Paul Howard and Congressman Doug Collins.
