SANDERSVILLE, Ga. — Attorneys for Eurie Martin's family say prosecutors should push for a second trial for the three deputies accused of killing him.
The lawyers and Martin's sister held a news conference via Zoom Wednesday to react to the trial's hung jury and mistrial declaration.
Henry Lee Copeland, Michael Howell and Rhett Scott were charged with murder. They tased Martin in July 2017 by the side of Deepstep Road.
Prosecutors said Martin did nothing wrong and the former deputies had no reason to stop him and try to detain him.
His sister, Helen Martin-Gilbert, said she didn't understand the outcome.
"I am very emotional. I literally cried myself to sleep last night, my heart is so heavy," she said.
While the three deputies are free, she said, "Our family, we cannot embrace him anymore, we can't talk to him anymore."
Francys Johnson, one of the attorneys for her family, said the whole community needs closure, not just the Martins.
"The public wants an answer as to whether this was a crime or not. The public wants a resolution, and Sandersville will never be the same until there is one."
Johnson said Middle Georgia Circuit District Attorney Tripp Fitzner needs to try the case again.
The three former deputies, he said, "chose not to be officers of the law, but to take the law into their own hands and be judge, jury, and executioner."
Johnson said he had no inside information on the hung jury or their final vote, but he said he was troubled that a distant cousin of one of the deputies was allowed to serve on the jury.
He also praised the work by Fitzner's staff and the previous DA, Hayward Altman, who fought to bring the case to trial.
"The Middle Georgia District has taught America a lesson about how to prosecute without fear or favor," he said.
But he also said the jury's failure to convict Copeland, Howell and Scott shows that America still won't hold police accountable for deaths of African-Americans. Martin was Black; the three former deputies are all White.
"We haven't seen police accountability anywhere in America," he said. "What we're trying do to in Sandersville is something we've not seen anywhere in this country."
13WMAZ could not reach Fitzner for comment Wednesday afternoon. Defense lawyers in the case declined comment Tuesday.