B.J. Johnson Update — It’s official: It was an accident

The grand jury cleared George County sher­iff deputy Joe Sul­li­van of any wrong­do­ing last Thurs­day in the death of foot­ball player Bil­ley Joe John­son.  They ruled there was no way Sul­li­van could have shot and killed Bil­ley Joe — he was try­ing to move his shot­gun inside his vehi­cle.  But is that enough for the fam­ily and the NAACP?

Appar­ently not.

I don’t believe it hap­pened the way they said it hap­pened. And I’m not going to let this go.

That is a quote from Billey’s dad on Thurs­day.  I under­stand they are in a lot of pain, and they want to place blame some­where.  But not every­thing has to be someone’s fault.  It was an acci­dent — not sui­cide or murder.

Now the NAACP is mulling over whether to bring a civil suit against the officer.

“We’ve got to get enough evi­dence to con­tra­dict what the grand jury says,” said George County NAACP pres­i­dent Willie Gaines, who was among dozens of friends and fam­ily who crowded into the cour­t­house in Lucedale to lis­ten to the report.

If you have the evi­dence, why didn’t you present it dur­ing the inves­ti­ga­tion??  What proof do you really have?  Why are you try­ing to make this into a race case?  Don’t you think the fam­i­lies of Bil­ley Joe and Joe Sul­li­van have suf­fered enough?  Let it go already.  It was a ter­ri­ble, tragic accident.

Here’s some links to news­pa­pers through­out the region that are cov­er­ing this case.

• JOHN L. PITTS:Pray that jus­tice has been done for Bil­ley Joe
• GRAND JURY: NO WRONGDOING
• Time to heal in tragic Bil­ley Joe John­son story
• Open­ness in Lucedale but not in Prichard
• THE WEEK IN CRIME
• NAACP mulls civil rights claim in athlete’s death
• NAACP con­sid­ers civil rights claim in teen’s death

Related Posts:

• B.J. John­son Update: Grand Jury Find­ings to Become Pub­lic Thursday
• Local foot­ball player shot, inves­ti­ga­tion underway