Sheriff on officer-involved shooting: ‘We did it right’
Shelby County Sheriff Floyd Bonner said he is confident in his department’s actions following a police shooting at an apartment complex on Wednesday morning.
Bonner, who spoke to members of Frayser Exchange at Impact Baptist Church, said on Thursday morning his department will always grieve when a person loses their life at the hands of a law enforcement officer.
But in this situation, Bonner said he is convinced that officers responded appropriately.
“They did what they were trained to do, they did it in a proper way. We did it the right way and we are confident in what happened yesterday,” Bonner said to the crowd.
The shooting took place between 2 and 3 a.m.
A deputy was shot during the exchange of gunfire. The sheriff’s office told the Commercial Appeal the deputy was released from the hospital late Thursday afternoon.
Keyshon Parham, 19, who was killed, had multiple warrants, according to a Tennessee Bureau of Investigations spokesperson.
Officers from the Shelby County Sheriff’s Office and the Memphis Police Department arrived at the Eden at Watersedge apartment complex to arrest Parham.
When officers attempted to conduct a search warrant of Parham’s home, Parham fled — leading to a foot chase, according to TBI.
The details of how the deputy was wounded from the shooting are not clear. The deputy who was shot did not fire his weapon, but two other deputies did.
Parham was identified as the suspect in an Oct. 9 shooting that injured three people in the area of I-40 and Hollywood. Bonner said the findings from the TBI investigation will be made public in the months to come.
Bringing in body cameras
Bonner said he was not sold on using body cameras in his department initially.
But as the public has searched for more transparency from local police departments, Bonner believed it was the right step to take.
“I will say this about body cameras: I wasn’t a big fan of them a few years ago. But it is something that the public wanted to see,” said Bonner.
“We certainly want to provide transparency to the public,” he said.
Every single deputy will not have a body camera, but the majority of them will, according to Bonner.
The department has started sending body cameras to the patrol unit, according to Buckner. He said they plan to deploy more cameras to deputies over the next few months.
When it comes to deputies interacting with residents, including the use of bodycameras, Bonner said his department looks to deescalate situations.
“The body camera is there also to be another eye, another person. The camera is a good thing,” Bonner said.
Buckner said that school officers received a set of body cameras a little over a year ago and, as time progressed, more deputies were equipped with them on their daily patrols.
The sheriff ’s department has 60 officers in schools with body cameras. They previously used dashboard cameras, which had been in place since the late 1990s, Buckner said.
“Now we are starting to deploy a sample amount to our patrol units and we will transition to the newer cameras with our school officers,” said Buckner.