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📣 The family of Roger Fortson has filed a federal lawsuit against the Okaloosa County Sheriff’s Office, former Deputy Eddie Duran, and others for his 2024 shooting death in his home.
🏛️ Attorney Ben Crump announced the suit at a Fort Walton Beach church, citing unconstitutional practices, poor training, and false reporting by an apartment complex employee.
⚖️ Former Deputy Eddie Duran faces a motion hearing on May 20 and a pretrial conference in June, as supporters call for sustained accountability and justice.
The Family of Roger Fortson, the Airman who was shot and killed by an Okaloosa County Sheriff’s Deputy in his home last year, announced in a press conference that they sued the Okaloosa County Sheriff’s Office and the Apartment Complex where he lived for damages.
The suit was filed by Atlanta-area attorney Ben Crump’s team, who filed the federal civil rights suit in the Federal District of Northern Florida with the Pensacola division.
Supporters of the Fortson family, members of the Party for Socialism and Liberation of Florida (PSL) and Fort Walton Beach Police Chief Robert Bage, several TV crews, and the organizers of the event – a half dozen members of the NAACP made about 20 total attendees at the conference.
Jets from Eglin Air Force Base could be heard thundering overhead and above the constant hum of the sound system as the press conference started from the pulpit of the church.
A muted atmosphere prevailed despite the signs brought in by the members of the PSL – which were leaned against the pews next to their owners.
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After a fifteen-minute or so delay – Ben Crump, Chantimekki (Meka) Fortson (Roger Fortson’s Mother), one of Roger’s cousins, and other members of the legal team walked in from a side room at the rear of the church and headed to the pulpit. Crump wore a crisp dark suit with a green tie and an eagle on his lapel. The two Fortson family members wore T-shirts with graphical displays of Fortson and Air Force iconography.
Crump spoke first for about fifteen minutes. He outlined the claims against the apartment complex, Okaloosa County Sheriff Eric Aden and the Sheriff’s Office, Former Deputy Eddie Duran, and an unidentified witness, a leasing agent at the company known in the lawsuit as Jane Doe.
RELATED: Former Okaloosa Deputy Charged in Death of Hurlburt Airman Fortson
“There must be accountability,” Crump said as he announced the suit at the press conference, “because justice for Roger Fortson means holding everybody responsible. He deserves full justice. He doesn’t deserve three-fifths justice. He doesn’t deserve half-justice. If anybody deserves full justice, it’s Roger Fortson.”
Meka Fortson was more circumspect about the situation than in past press conferences. She previously wept for the loss of her son. In the replacement of open grief, she showed a face of grim determination in the face of exhaustion.
“I don’t know why people keep saying justice. There’s no justice for my baby. I want accountability,” Fortson said to the group gathered, “I want accountability because he was in his own home. I want accountability because Florida gave him a permit to carry the gun that he had pointed down [at the ground].”
I asked Crump about Aden’s landslide election victory that came last August – after this shooting and the so-called ‘Acorn Incident’ took place last year – and what it means for this case and the situation surrounding civil rights generally. He responded that “The hope is that he will keep his word to the citizens to uphold the constitution for all citizens, those who are serving in the military while they’re away from home in Okaloosa County, he will keep his word to Meka Fortson. He said as a parent, that he would do everything. So, we want him to keep his word.”
“Do you believe him?” I pushed.
Meka Fortson shook her head. Crump answered. “His actions speak so loud I need not hear his words.”
I asked him specifically what accountability looks like in this case. He answered with a question. “Whatever you would want if this were your child – She [Meka Fortson] wants the same – nothing more, nothing less.”
I asked about the Air Force’s role and support of the Fortson family in the wake of the shooting throughout this press conference. Crump turned the microphone over to Fortson to respond.
“They reach out. They call us when I come down here and get my itinerary and make sure I am safe when I am here,” Fortson said, “It’s not what they have done – it’s what they are doing. They’re keeping their men, and [they are] their brother’s keeper. So, they are making sure we can come and go as we please because I don’t feel safe down here. I don’t feel safe down here at all.”
The lawsuit, which you can see below, sues four parties. Sheriff Aden, Eddie Duran, Chez Élan Fl Property, LLC, and Jane Doe.
The civil suit alleges that “Mr. Fortson, who was lawfully in possession of a legally owned firearm and posed no threat, was killed as a result of a cascade of negligent, reckless, and unconstitutional actions by both law enforcement and the apartment complex where he resided.”
Allegations against Jane Doe
The lawsuit begins by alleging that the leasing agent for the apartments who called law enforcement about a disturbance, Jane Doe [Crump and his team have not yet been able to identify the agent], didn’t know what was going on when she called the police to report a disturbance. The suit claims Doe sent law enforcement to Fortson’s apartment and claimed Fortson was actively fighting with someone without verifying whether or not that was the case.
Allegations against Eddie Duran
From there, the lawsuit focuses on Duran’s actions. The lawsuit critiques Duran’s decision not to announce himself at the door to Fortson initially and his position to stand out of sight of the peephole on the apartment door.
After Fortson opened the door with his pistol in his right hand [Meka Fortson repeatedly said at several of the press conferences she has participated in with Crump that Roger was left-handed], Duran shot and killed him.
After the shooting, the lawsuit claims Duran made no effort to render aid to Fortson. It goes on to use an Okaloosa County Sheriff’s Office Internal Affairs investigation to support its claim that the shooting was not justified by highlighting the fact that the investigation “determined that Deputy Duran’s use of deadly force was not objectively reasonable” and that “The IA report also determined that Mr. Fortson did not make any hostile or attacking movements, and that deadly force was not justified under the Sheriff’s own policies.”
Allegations against Chez Élan
The apartment then shifts to its allegations against the apartment complex itself. It claims the apartment complex “owed a duty of care to Mr. Fortson, to exercise reasonable care in making emergency reports to law enforcement. Both the Élan Apartments and Doe, its employee, failed to meet their duty.”
I placed a call and left a message for Binyamin Beitel, the representative of the Beitel Group – the company that owns Chez Élan Apartment Complex. Should he or a company representative choose to respond, we will update this story here.
Allegations against Sheriff Aden
The lawsuit alleges a cornucopia of faults and failures on the part of Sheriff Eric Aden.
By serving as the policymaker for Okaloosa County, the lawsuit claims, the ‘buck stopped with him’ regarding what deputies under his command do and the policies they follow or fail to follow.
The lawsuit then claims three discrete failings on Aden’s part as the Sheriff:
“Deputy Duran’s use of deadly force—within seconds of the door
being opened—was not an isolated incident or the result of a rogue actor,” the suit claims, “It was a foreseeable consequence of the Sheriff’s inadequate and unconstitutional training practices, which failed to equip deputies with the skills and restraint necessary to assess and safely respond to ambiguous or non-threatening encounters, including
non-combative encounters in civilian homes. Notably, just months before the killing of Roger Fortson, the Sheriff’s Internal Affairs unit completed an internal investigation into another deputy-involved shooting (IA 2023-031, “Acorn Incident”), and produced a report attached as Exhibit B. In this incident, Deputy Jesse Hernandez fired multiple rounds into the rear of his patrol vehicle at a handcuffed, unarmed suspect based on a mistaken belief that he was under attack. In reality, an acorn had struck the vehicle. The IA unit concluded that Deputy Hernandez’s use of deadly force was not objectively reasonable and violated departmental policy.Despite the Hernandez incident, the Sheriff failed to implement any
systemic corrective measures, retraining, or policy revisions to address the use of deadly force in the absence of clear and immediate threats. The pattern of unjustified force continued with the fatal shooting of Roger Fortson under similarly preventable circumstances.”
I have reached out to the Okaloosa County Sheriff’s Office Public Information unit to request comment and an interview with Sheriff Aden about the suit in his capacity as a public servant and elected official in Okaloosa County. We will update this story if he decides to respond or schedule an interview.
Former Okaloosa County Sheriff’s Deputy Eddie Duran will be in Court on May 20, 2025, in relation to this case for a motion hearing. The Okaloosa County Clerk’s Office does not reveal on its website the motion’s intent or details.
The hearing will take place in Fort Walton Beach, and members of the Party for Socialism and Liberation say they will appear to protest. Sol Alfonso, a member of the political party, says they have followed this case and worked to keep it front of mind since the shooting took place in May of 2024.
“We’ve kind of been a part of this fight since the beginning. We’ve been keeping the fight up, keeping the pressure up,” said party member Sol Alfonso. They say that the dip in awareness frustrated them as the killing moved farther away from the present, “It seemed like [awareness about Fortson’s killing] died down. Everybody just wasn’t talking about it anymore. So this [civil lawsuit] is really awesome.”
The court has scheduled the pretrial conference for Duran’s criminal case on June 9, 2025. The court rescheduled the pretrial conference for the case three times over the last year.
Please see below for more coverage we have published on this incident.
