EXCLUSIVE: Attorney For Deputy Who Killed Unarmed Black Man Talks To TPM

The white Oklahoma reserve sheriff’s deputy charged with manslaughter in the fatal shooting of an unarmed black man has received threats and been harassed by the media in recent weeks, according to one of his attorneys.

Corbin Brewster, a member of the defense team representing Tulsa County Sheriff’s Reserve Deputy Robert Bates, spoke about the threats and other details of the case in a phone interview Friday with TPM.

Brewster (whose father, attorney Clark Brewster, is pictured above with Bates) told TPM that both Bates and his lawyers have received threats referencing the man Bates killed, Eric Harris.

“Random anonymous phone calls which are, I’ll be honest, quite frightening in light of Mr. Harris — I mean on his Facebook he claims gang affiliation with the Crips,” he said. “So when you receive an anonymous threat involving reference to Mr. Harris, I think it’s particularly alarming.”

Daniel Smolen, an attorney representing the Harris family, did not immediately respond on Friday afternoon to a request for comment from TPM about the allegations of gang affiliation. Bates told investigators after the shooting that on the day of the undercover operation, Harris was described to him as a convicted felon and a “bad son of a bitch” who had gang affiliations. News reports and statements from the sheriff’s office have not identified Harris as a gang member or mentioned any affiliation with a gang.

Brewster also addressed questions about Bates’ training that have surfaced in the Tulsa World newspaper. The paper reported, based on anonymous sources, that sheriff’s office supervisors had falsified records for firearms and other training for Bates.

What follows is a partial transcript of TPM’s conversation with Brewster that has been condensed and lightly edited for clarity.

TPM: Sheriff Stanley Glantz, in a radio podcast interview earlier this week, said that there were some records related to Bates’ firearms training that his office couldn’t locate. Today Bates said that he has proof of his training in writing. How does his legal team reconcile those two things?

There’s no missing firearm records in terms of his score. The way that your firearm qualification works is you go to the range, you shoot — I don’t know how many rounds you have to shoot, like 100 rounds or something — and they are scored by a firearms instructor, I believe. That score is then reported into a system that logs the score and if you qualify then you go forward. The notes of the firearm instructor are not necessarily kept. In the sheriff’s case I think — and I don’t represent the sheriff’s office in this matter — but I think those are the records he’s referring to, the underlying notes of the firearm instructor. They don’t have those. Now the qualification scores that were entered into his personnel file, they do exist, and his record of his firearms qualifications.

Mr. Bates also told investigators after the shooting that he became a reserve deputy in 2007, while the sheriff’s office said that he joined the reserve deputy program in 2008.

I believe it’s a misstatement. Now that we’ve gone back and looked at those records I think he joined in 2008. It’s pretty clear. Mr. Bates did not intend to deceive anyone or misstate the dates. I think he just confused 2007 with 2008.

Is your legal team aware of any waivers or exemptions that Mr. Bates may have been granted by the sheriff’s office in terms of field training or any firearms certifications?

I believe because Mr. Bates was a former police officer he was grandfathered in certain CLEET [Council on Law Enforcement Education and Training] training requirements.

Is the legal team aware of any political activity that Bates has been involved in outside of chairing the sheriff’s 2012 re-election campaign and donating to that effort?

I don’t know. I bet you have the tools to look that up quicker than I could. Don’t you keep records of any donations to any politician, like OpenSecrets? Honestly I haven’t checked and I don’t think that his political involvement is relevant.

How is Mr. Bates is dealing with the scrutiny from this case? Have there been any threats or harassment toward him?

We had one producer tell us that she was begging for an interview with Mr. Bates which we declined. She made the comment “Am I gonna have to stalk him until I get it?” Another producer was in his window, with his hands on the window, peeking into his home while his wife was there and it frightened her. There were several news vans parked outside his house for several days. That’d be three examples.

So he’s under more scrutiny from the media than from, say, citizens who are upset about this incident?

I think he’s received direct threats too. We’ve had threats called into our office. Random anonymous phone calls which are, I’ll be honest, quite frightening in light of Mr. Harris — I mean on his Facebook he claims gang affiliation with the Crips. So when you receive an anonymous threat involving reference to Mr. Harris, I think it’s particularly alarming.

Is there any information that you feel the media should be aware of with relation to this case?

I think this is something that could have happened to any police officer in a high pressure, moment-to-moment situation like the one that confronted Mr. Bates. The focus on his age and all these other extraneous details loses sight of what police officers face every day in terms of threats and danger when they’re working on the streets.

The other point I would make to you is that a lot has been made about Mr. Bates’ age. He was not assigned as part of the take down team, or the arrest team or the undercover team. Mr. Bates was driving a sheriff’s Tahoe that had evidence bags, a camera, gloves, other crime scene tools and equipment that was going to be used in the execution of a search warrant at Mr. Harris’ house. When the undercover buy went down, Mr. Bates was blocks away in what they call a containment position. It was never in the plan for him to be involved at all or have any contact with Mr. Harris.

The plan was to have a quick and clean arrest following the gun deal and then to execute the search warrant at Mr. Harris’ apartment. When Mr. Harris ran, he ran several blocks away from the undercover buy directly towards Mr. Bates, activating him into an emergent, highly tense situation. Mr. Bates, as a reserve deputy, was duty bound to assist and he was making an attempt to assist other officers when the gun was fired and he accidentally shot Mr. Harris. So I think there’s been some misconception with, why are we putting this 73-year-old in the middle of this high-pressure situation? That really wasn’t the plan. Mr. Harris’ decision to run from police created that situation.