ATLANTA — Famed civil rights and personal injury attorney Ben Crump announced a wrongful death lawsuit in the death of a Georgia woman who died after falling out of a deputy patrol vehicle.
Crump and the family of Brianna Grier held a news conference Wednesday.
The lawsuit is calling for accountability from Hancock Sheriff's Department, naming Lt. Marlin Primus, Deputy Timothy Legette, and Sheriff Tomlyn Primus as defendants. According to Crump, the listed Hancock officials "participated in gross negligence that led to Grier's wrongful death."
Crump and Georgia NAACP President Gerald Griggs, who was also in attendance, pointed to ongoing mental health issues within the state and what they see as a failure on the part of law enforcement in dealing with such situations.
Grier's mother also spoke, specifically about the impact Brianna's death has had on her two children.
"They constantly asking about their mother," Grier's mother, Mary, stated. "I don't lie to them, I tell them the truth, she went home to live with god."
In addition she spoke on the way her daughter was treated just before her death, stating "she wasn't no animal she wasn't no bad person, she just had some problems she couldn't control."
On July 15, 2022, Grier's mother called Hancock Sheriff's Department deputies to her home in Sparta reporting that her daughter was having a mental health crisis.
According to a 10-minute body camera video released by the Georgia Bureau of Investigation, officers arrived at the home between 12 a.m. and 1 a.m., handcuffed Grier's hands in front of her and dragged her to the patrol car.
However, deputies did not close the rear passenger side door properly before leaving the scene.
A short distance later, Grier fell out of the moving patrol car resulting in two fractures in her skull. She was airlifted to Grady Memorial Hospital where she went into a coma and died six days later on July 21.
An independent pathology review done by Pathologist Dr. Allecia Wilson of the University of Michigan also confirmed Grier died from blunt force trauma to the head and swelling in the brain as a result of the fractures in her skull.
The GBI's investigation found that officers had no contact with Grier until she fell out of the patrol car. In November 2022, the GBI presented its findings to the Ocmulgee Circuit District Attorney and the office decided against pursuing the case.
The 28-year-old left behind twin girls and parents searching for closure in her death.