Hundreds pack funeral for Roger Fortson, the Black airman killed in his home by a Florida deputy (2024)

STONECREST, Ga. (AP) — Hundreds of Air Force members in dress blues joined Roger Fortson’s family, friends and others at a suburban Atlanta megachurch on Friday to pay their final respects to the Black senior airman, who was shot and killed in his Florida home earlier this month by a sheriff’s deputy.

People lined up well before the start of the service at the New Birth Missionary Baptist Church in Stonecrest to file past the open coffin and say their goodbyes to Fortson, who was shot six times by a deputy responding to a May 3 call about a possible domestic violence situation at Fortson’s apartment complex in the Florida Panhandle. He was 23.

Fortson’s face and upper body were visible in his Air Force uniform, with an American flag draped over the lower half of the coffin. After viewing the body, many mourners paused to hug one another.

“As you can see from the sea of Air Force blue, I am not alone in my admiration of Senior Airman Fortson,” Col. Patrick Dierig told mourners, referring to the rows of airmen who took up nearly an entire section of the sprawling church.

“We would like to take credit for making him great, but the truth is that he was great before he came to us,” said Dierig, who commands the 1st Special Operations Wing at Hurlburt Air Force Base in Florida, where Fortson was stationed.

The Fortson family’s lawyer, civil rights attorney Ben Crump, delivered a rousing address, telling the gathering: “We will remember him for the American patriot he was.”

“He was the best from East Atlanta. ... He was the best from the state of Georgia. He was the best from America. He was one of the best this world had to offer,” Crump said.

On Thursday, Fortson’s mother vowed to get justice for her son, who had served in overseas combat zones.