FORT WALTON BEACH, Fla. (AP) — A judge on Thursday allowed bail to be granted for a Florida sheriff’s deputy who was fired and charged with murder after he shot and killed a senior U.S. Air Force soldier within the doorway of a Black man’s apartment.

Former Okaloosa County Sheriff’s Deputy Eddie Duran, 38, could resist 30 years in prison if convicted of murder with a firearm, a rare charge against a Florida law enforcement officer. Duran’s body camera recorded him shooting Roger Fortson, 23, on May 3, just after Fortson opened the door with the gun pointed at the ground.

Judge Terrance R. Ketchel set bail at $100,000 and said Duran cannot possess a firearm or leave the premises, though he is not going to be required to wear a GPS tracker. He was released from jail shortly after Thursday’s hearing, jail records show.

Duran’s arrest warrant was issued Thursday, pending a detention hearing, despite arguments from his attorney Rodney Smith that there was no probable cause to arrest him.

“He spent his entire life … his entire career and military career trying to save people, help people,” Smith said at Thursday’s hearing. “He is not a threat to the community.”

Prosecutor Mark Alderman said “this is a case where we all know what happened.”

“We all saw what happened,” he said. “It’s just a matter of interpretation. We all saw that Mr. Duran killed Roger Fortson. It’s obvious that’s a very serious charge.”

Duran had been homeschooling his six children in recent months while he was unemployed and his wife worked full time, Smith said. Duran sat quietly within the courtroom Thursday, wearing a pink striped prison jumpsuit and glasses. He conferred along with his lawyers and the occasional clang of metal handcuffs might be heard.

The Okaloosa County Sheriff’s Office initially said Duran fired in self-defense after being confronted by a person with a gun, but Sheriff Eric Aden fired back on May 31 after an internal investigation found his life was not in peril when he opened fire. Outside law enforcement experts have also said an officer can’t shoot simply because a possible suspect is holding a gun if there isn’t a threat.

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Duran was responding to a report of a physical fight at an apartment in a Fort Walton Beach complex. An worker identified Fortson’s apartment as the situation, based on sheriff’s investigators. Fortson was alone in his apartment on the time, talking to his girlfriend on a FaceTime video call. Duran’s body camera footage showed what happened next.

After knocking repeatedly, Fortson opened the door. Authorities say Duran shot him multiple times before telling Fortson to place the gun down.

Duran told investigators he saw aggression in Fortson’s eyes and shot because “I’m standing there thinking I’m about to get shot, I’m about to die.”

In a press release after Thursday’s hearing, Smith said the deputy’s actions “were reasonable and appropriate given the information he was provided regarding the nature and urgency of what he deemed to be a potentially dangerous domestic situation.”

In a press release, he described Fortson as “an individual who armed himself before he simply responded to what may have been nothing more than a routine attempt by law enforcement to prevent a domestic violence situation from escalating.”

At Thursday’s hearing, Smith said his team had cooperated with authorities, saying “we turned him in. He’s not going anywhere.”

Smith confirmed there was video evidence of the shooting and that the case was within the national interest.

“We know we have defenses that we intend to use … qualified immunity, defending our position with respect to law enforcement,” Smith said.

The fatal shooting of the Georgia airman was only one in a growing list of black people being killed by law enforcement officers in their very own homes, and it has also renewed debate over Florida’s “Stand and Fight” law. Hundreds of Air Force blues joined Fortson’s family, friends and others at his funeral.

A wrongly convicted Texas man who spent 34 years in prison for a Eighties murder was acquitted Thursday, saying that while he couldn’t get back the years he lost, he’s glad and moving forward.

“I’m excited this day has finally come,” said Benjamin Spencer, 59.

A Dallas County judge granted the district attorney’s office’s request to dismiss aggravated robbery charge against Spencer, who was originally convicted in 1987 of murder in reference to the carjacking and death of Jeffrey Young.

“It’s a good day,” said defense attorney Cheryl Wattley, who has worked on Spencer’s case for greater than 20 years. “I’m trying not to cry.”

Wattley praised Dallas County District Attorney John Creuzot for taking a serious take a look at evidence that had been discredited in the case.

Creuzot said he felt “relieved and humbled to be able to help correct this injustice.”

Prosecution witnesses, including a jailhouse informant who had sought a lenient sentence, gave false testimony, Creuzot said. He added that prosecutors on the time also failed to supply the defense with evidence that may have excluded Spencer from the crime, including fingerprints.

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Spencer, who maintained his innocence, later saw his 1987 conviction overturned. However, he was retried and sentenced to life in prison for the aggravated robbery of Young.

He was released on bail in 2021 after the district attorney’s office found that his constitutional rights had been violated and that he had not received a good trial because of false witness statements and the concealment of evidence.

Earlier this 12 months, the Texas Court of Criminal (*34*) overturned his conviction and sent the case back to Dallas County.

Assistant District Attorney Cynthia Garza, who heads the Conviction Integrity Unit, said: “There is no credible or physical evidence that he was in any way involved in this crime.”

Spencer is one in every of 60 individuals with the longest convictions to be found innocent, in line with the National Registry of Exonerations.

Under Texas law, he’s entitled to a lump sum of as much as $80,000 for annually of imprisonment, plus a pension, Wattley said.

Wattley said Spencer tries to live honorably and “strives to be an example that others can be inspired by.”

The existence of the Ku Klux Klan alone is reason enough to be concerned and query our federal government as to why an overtly racist, hate-filled organization was allowed to exist for therefore long. Apparently, conservative media personality Tomi Lahren didn’t get the memo.

Lahren appeared in Daily program with Trevor Noah on Wednesday night, and when Noah modified the subject of the conversation to her baseless criticism of the Black Lives Matter Movement, she foolishly tried to defend her tactic of describing the modern civil rights organization as “the new Ku Klux Klan.”

“When the Black Lives Matter movement comes out with signs saying ‘fry them like bacon’ and ‘down with the police’ and when they come out and say ‘if you see a white person, target them’ … that’s what happens, Trevor,” she said.

The most embarrassing moment in Lahren’s speech got here when she tried to reduce the Ku Klux Klan’s brutal history of racist attacks, inhumane murders and torture.

“So when that becomes the narrative and you start looting and burning and rioting… what did the KKK do?” Lahren asked. Naturally, her bogus query was met with a barrage of “boohoos” from the audience and a surprised look from Noah himself.

In an effort to remind Tomi Lahren and anyone else who seems to suffer from a little bit of amnesia about the history of brutal crimes committed by the Ku Klux Klan in America, let’s take a have a look at a number of of them.

1. Tulsa Race Riots – Tulsa, Oklahoma, 1921

Between 21 and 200 blacks were murdered when residents rioted after a black man was accused of raping a white woman. Tulsa KKK founder W. Tate Brady participated in the riots.

2. Murder of Emmett Till – Money, Mississippi 1955

Emmett Till was a 14-year-old black boy who was severely beaten to the point that his face was disfigured and one eye was ejected from its socket. He was then fatally shot, tied to a fan, and thrown into the Tallahatchie River by two white men for allegedly flirting with a white woman while visiting a neighborhood store.

3. Murder of Judge Edward Aaron – Birmingham, Alabama 1957

Edward Aaron was a black foreman who was kidnapped by the Ku Klux Klan, severely beaten, castrated with a straight razor, and left for dead in a close-by stream.

4. Murder of Willie Edwards – Alabama River, Alabama, 1957

Willie Edwards was kidnapped by a member of the Ku Klux Klan, severely beaten in his automobile, after which forced at gunpoint to leap 125 feet off a bridge over the Alabama River to his death.

5. sixteenth Street Baptist Church bombing wherein 4 black schoolgirls were killed – Birmingham, Alabama 1963

The Ku Klux Klan took responsibility for strategically placing bombs outside a black church just before Sunday school ended. The bombs later exploded and killed 4 black schoolgirls, ages 11 to 14.

6. Murder of Medgar Evers – Jackson, Mississippi, 1963

Medgar Evers was a civil rights activist, husband, and father who was murdered by Ku Klux Klan member Byron De La Beckwith in his driveway as he returned from a gathering with NAACP lawyers.

7. Murder of Viola Liuzzo – Selma, Alabama 1965

Viola Liuzzo was a white civil rights activist, mother, and wife who was shot twice in the head by 4 Ku Klux Klan members who became enraged once they saw her riding in a automobile with a black man who was also an activist.

8. Murder of Michael Donald – Mobile, Alabama, 1981

Michael Donald was killed by members of the Ku Klux Klan after he was accused of murdering a white police officer. The Ku Klux Klan beat him with a tree branch, strangled him with a rope, and slit his throat before hanging him from a tree in his neighborhood backyard.

9. Mount Zion AME Church in Flames – Greelyville, South Carolina 1995

The Mount Zion AME Church was burned to the ground by members of the Ku Klux Klan but was later rebuilt.

10. Murder of Jason Smith – Eros, Louisiana, 2011

Jason Smith was a 14-year-old black student from Louisiana who was found dead in a neighborhood lake with none organs. Although his death was ruled an “accidental drowning,” his father and family maintain that the killing was the work of local Ku Klux Klan members.

11. Jewish Community Center Murders – Overland Park, Kansas 2014

Former Ku Klux Klan leader Frazier Glenn Miller Jr. murdered three people by opening fire at a neighborhood Jewish community center.

12. Stabbing of Ku Klux Klan protesters at rally – Anaheim, California 2016

Three people were stabbed by members and supporters of the Ku Klux Klan during a protest against their rally in California.