JACKSONVILLE, Fla. – The families of three Black residents killed in a racially motivated shooting at a Jacksonville Dollar General store are speaking out about the lawsuit they’ve filed.
They’re suing the store, the security company and the shooter’s parents.
Prominent civil rights attorney Ben Crump, along with lawyer Michael Haggard, is representing the families of Jerald Gallion, Angela Carr and A.J. Laguerre Jr.
The lawyers for the deceased said they could prove that a security presence on the day of the shooting could have prevented the deaths of three African Americans who were targeted because of the color of their skin.
Lawyers are alleging that Dollar General failed to protect its customers and its employees — putting its massive profits over the protection of the community — and state that the shooter’s family should have been aware that he was a dangerous person with an obsession with firearms and violence.
“Dollar General the blood is on your hands too,” Crump said during a news conference Tuesday.
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Crump said lawyers have the evidence that proves that any security presence at the Grand Park Dollar General Store on Aug. 26 could have possibly saved the lives of the three individuals.
“They continually have assaults, violent batteries, attempted murders, robberies at their stores,” Haggard said. “In fact, police chiefs across America have been quoted as saying they are simply a magnet for crime.”
On the day of the murders, Lawyers said the mass shooter first went to a Family Dollar store, but was deterred by a security van in the parking lot. Minutes later, they say he then went to Edward Waters College where he was approached by a security guard as he was putting on a military-style tactical vest, before leaving.
Lawyers then say Palmeter drove roughly a mile and entered a Dollar General Store where there was no security — killing the first Black people he saw.
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“I’m so tired of hearing, ‘Oh, you know, he’s in a better place’,” Quantavious Laguerre, A.J.’s Brother, said. “No, I want him here. I’m tired of hearing. Oh, you know, he’s watching over, you know, I want him here, you know, and people say cherish the memories that you have, you know, I want to make more. He’s my baby brother. He’s supposed to bury me, not me burying him.”
Laguerre said the store hid the company’s history of crime from his deceased brother who worked as a store clerk.
“Had AJ known that Dollar General was a dangerous place, he would have never even had applied to work there.”
Armisha Payne, Angela Carr’s sister, said this has shattered her entire family. Payne said her sister Angela was shot in the parking lot while driving a car for Uber. Carr was murdered while looking down and texting her family that she was on her way home.
“So, it’s hard to explain that when you have six and five and four year-olds and baby babies, and we have little kids at home — it’s hard to explain how Nana’s gone,” Payne said.
Lawyers are also seeking damages from the shooter’s parents.
“What did the parents know about the AR-15 that he bought?” Haggard said. “Just a couple of months before? Only a couple of years after he was Baker Acted? What did they know?”
News4JAX reached out to Dollar General for a comment on the filing of this lawsuit, we are still waiting to hear back.
The lawsuit included new photos of the shooter’s bedroom that showed bottles of alcohol, prescription pills and artwork that lawyers said glorifies death.
Attorneys said images like one that included a smiling teenager with a deceased child on a road should have alerted the shooter’s parents that their son was both a danger to himself and others.
Attorney Gene Nichols, who is not affiliated with the case, said there will be some challenges when it comes to suing the shooter’s parents.
“When it’s all said and done, he was an adult, he was a grown-up. He was not under the care of his parents though he may have been living there,” Nichols said.
After reading over the 91-page lawsuit for the first time on Monday, Nichols said the more significant claims are allegations of negligence on behalf of owners of the property and the security company hired by Dollar General. The lawsuit reads in part the defendant Dollar General and their security company should have known, that before Aug. 26 that “numerous criminal acts including, but not limited to, shootings, assaults, muggings, batteries, burglaries, robberies, and drug dealing, occurred on or around the subject premises, and throughout adjacent areas.” According to the lawsuit, the Grand Park store was burglarized the day before the shooting.
“The allegations in the complaint are very clear that this neighborhood, that this location was unfortunately populated with crime, that there have been multiple events of crime in that area. And that will become part of the litigation,” Nichols said.
According to the Jacksonville Sheriff’s Office, the shooter, who was from Clay County, left a detailed manifesto, which in his own words explained why he specifically targeted Black residents at Dollar General. The manifesto has yet to be released and could contain information that could either benefit the prosecution or the defense, according to experts.
The families of the three victims along with Crump and attorneys Michael Haggard and Adam Finkel are expected to lay out their case, and the victims’ families may talk as well.