New developments regarding a Thanksgiving night shooting at the Riverchase Galleria in Alabama suggest that the man police fatally shot, who was originally identified as the gunman, may not have been responsible for injuring an 18-year-old male and a 12-year-old female bystander during the incident.
In a statement released on Friday night by the Hoover Police Department, Captain Gregg Rector wrote that while issuing updates during an investigation is unusual for the department, police believed that some of the “preliminary information” surrounding the case had likely not been accurate.
“Preliminary information gathered last night indicated that two individuals were involved in a physical altercation that led to a 21-year-old male shooting an 18-year-old male multiple times,” Rector wrote, summarizing the original findings.
Although Rector confirmed that the 18-year-old victim, who has yet to be identified, was shot and is still at UAB Hospital, the facts about the other male, who has been identified as Emantic Fitzgerald Bradford Jr., have changed.
“Over the past 20 hours, Jefferson County Sheriff’s Office investigators and crime scene technicians have interviewed numerous individuals and examined several evidentiary items. New evidence now suggests that while Mr. Bradford may have been involved in some aspect of the altercation, he likely did not fire the rounds that injured the 18-year-old,” Rector wrote.
“Investigators now believe that more than two individuals were involved in the initial altercation. This information indicates that there is at least one gunman still at-large, who could be responsible for the shooting of the 18-year-old male and 12-year-old female,” Rector continued. “We regret that our initial media release was not totally accurate, but new evidence suggests that it was not.”
The press release also confirmed that the Alabama Law Enforcement Agency had taken over leading the investigation.
Neither Hoover police nor the ALEA immediately responded to PEOPLE’s messages.
— Hoover Police Dept (@HooverPD) November 24, 2018
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In a press release issued on Friday morning, the police previously confirmed that the officer involved in the shooting “has been placed on administrative leave pending the outcome of the investigation,” as is standard in such cases.
In the initial statement, police wrote that a fight broke out at the shopping center at 9:52 p.m., after which “one of the males produced a handgun and shot the other male twice in the torso.” After hearing gunfire, two uniformed Hoover police officers approached the area, and after allegedly seeing Bradford “brandishing a pistol,” one of the officers shot him. He was pronounced dead on the scene.
The 18-year-old female who was shot was taken to an area hospital in serious condition. The teenager, described by police as an “innocent bystander,” was hospitalized in stable condition.
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Although the shopping center was scheduled to be open until midnight, so that customers could start their Black Friday shopping early, the mall closed following the shooting.
The Riverchase Galleria was able to open back up on Friday, and will be open for its regularly scheduled hours over the weekend.
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On Saturday, protestors gathered at the Riverchase Galleria to demand justice for Bradford, reported WVTM.
Drawing comparisons to other black males who had been shot and killed by police officers, the group chanted “no justice, no peace” and “no racist police.”
After gunshots first broke out, witnesses told NBC News that hundreds of shoppers fled the area.
Multiple witnesses claimed to have heard up to 10 shots, NBC News reported.
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