OAKLAND COUNTY, Mich. – A man was shot and killed by an Oakland County Sheriff’s deputy after a struggle and a car crash in Pontiac back in August 2023.
Now, his family is filing a wrongful death lawsuit against Oakland County and the deputy who pulled the trigger.
The Oakland County Sheriff’s Office said its deputy acted in self-defense, shooting Jaquan Fletcher while hanging out the side of the car Fletcher was driving.
The deputy involved has not been criminally charged, so Local 4 will not be releasing his name. That deputy has since returned to his job.
Fletcher’s family said his actions did not warrant gunfire.
“Clearly, they didn’t think that he mattered,” Karyonda Vance, Fletcher’s mother, said. “They have options, and they have tasers, I’m sure. And that’s why we are here.”
Vance said Fletcher was her only son. He helped her out at her businesses at two different malls in Oakland County, and the day before he was killed, he spent time with his twins, who were two of his six children.
“He cherished every moment he had with his children,” Vance said.
Her attorney, Earnest Jarrett, described what happened the August morning Fletcher was killed and the evening that led up to it.
“After he left the party, he went to the car, and he fell asleep, and apparently his car was partially blocking someone’s driveway, and they called the police,” Jarrett said. “These two deputies responded.”
The lawsuit explains that deputies found a gun, removed that from the vehicle, and put it on the roof of it. Then, one deputy tried to wake him up by putting his left arm behind Fletcher’s back, but when deputies asked Fletcher to put his other arm behind his back, he didn’t respond.
The other deputy opened the passenger door to try to get Fletcher to comply.
“He did not threaten anybody physically, and he did not threaten anyone verbally,” said Jarrett. “He just pulled away; he was startled, it appears. When he was awakened, he put his car into drive, and he drove off. He was shot seconds later.”
“When I got there, they said that all parties were accounted for, and there was no foul play,” said Vance. “And we’re thinking, ‘What? Did he kill himself? What happened?’ Nobody disclosed anything. They instructed us to watch the 12 o’clock news that Michael Bouchard (Oakland County Sheriff) would be giving a press conference. During the press conference, the first thing they bought up was he was a felon, there was a weapon in the car. You (deputies) didn’t know him from a can of paint when you approached the car. You removed the weapon.”
“Mr. Fletcher was not a saint, and we’re not trying to pretend that he was, but whatever his prior activities may have been, it is not relevant to the choices that the deputies made at the time they came onto the scene where he was in his car,” Jarrett said.
Thursday, the Oakland County Sheriff’s Office said in a statement in response to the wrongful death lawsuit, “Any loss of life is always tragic. But, given the circumstances, our deputy had a right to defend himself from grave injury or death. We look forward to explaining the facts.”