Soon, the family of Leonard Cure will demand answers. They will want to know why he was pulled over on Interstate 95 on Monday morning. They will want to know why he was told to step out of his car. They will want to know why he was arrested. They will want to know how he resisted. They will want to know why police found lethal force necessary.
But today, the family of Leonard Cure grieves.
Seth Miller, executive director of the Innocence Project of Florida, said Cure, 53, was on his way back to Georgia after visiting his mother in the Fort Pierce area. After serving 16 years in prison for a crime he did not commit, Cure was embarking on a new chapter in his life, Miller said.
He had just closed on a new home. He had new bank accounts and investments, courtesy of an $817,000 compensation payment from the state of Florida. All those assets are in limbo now, Miller said, until Cure’s mother and family figure out what happens next.
“When he left his mother’s house, he told her ‘I love you and I’ll be back to see you,’” Miller said. “Next thing she knew, a law enforcement officer from Fort Pierce came to her door to tell her that her son was dead.”
Cure’s mother described it to Miller as “surreal” and “impossible.”
The Georgia Bureau of Investigation is looking into the traffic stop that ended Cure’s life. According to the Camden County Sheriff’s Office, Cure, who is Black, was pulled over about 7:30 a.m. Monday because he was driving 90 miles per hour in a 70 mph zone. The deputy who initiated the stop told Cure, who had been cooperating until that point, that he was under arrest.
Authorities say the arrest was for reckless driving.
At that point, according to an initial statement by the GBI, Cure began to resist. A stun gun was not enough to stop him from resisting. He “assaulted” the deputy, according to the statement. The stun gun was used again. So was the deputy’s baton, and finally, his gun.
Video recorded by the deputy’s body camera and patrol car dash camera will be reviewed along with the officer’s statement and other evidence before the agency sends its findings to prosecutors, said Stacy Carson, the GBI agent leading the investigation into the shooting.
Camden County Sheriff’s Capt. Larry Bruce said that no incident report for the shooting was available Tuesday and declined to release the video footage, citing the open investigation.
Bruce said Cure was reluctant to exit the vehicle — the deputy asked several times before he complied.
“When he got toward the back of the truck and he was going to be handcuffed, that’s when he turned violent,” Bruce said.
Authorities have not released the name of the deputy, who was placed on administrative leave. Carson said he is a white man.
For those who have been freed after a wrongful conviction, the sight of a police officer and the threat of arrest can trigger a post-traumatic response, said Stephanie Spurgeon, a Pinellas County woman who spent eight years in prison for manslaughter because of expert witness testimony that was later shown to be faulty.
“It’s a feeling that’s hard to articulate,” Spurgeon said. “Even having a police officer pull up behind you without the lights flashing awakens trauma. Panic. Terror. Absolute fear. And a sense that this can’t possibly be happening again.”
That dread is likely what Cure was feeling at the time of his arrest, Miller said. “One overarching, abiding, consistent fear they have is that at any moment, the liberty they worked so hard to regain is going to be ripped from them,” he said.
Studies show Black Americans face a disproportionate risk of being wrongfully convicted of crimes or killed by police.
Black people make up 13.6% of the American population but 53% of the 3,200 exonerations listed in the National Registry of Exonerations, according to a 2022 report by the registry.
Black Americans are seven times more likely than white Americans to be falsely convicted of serious crimes, the report said.
For those whose convictions are overturned, exoneration is often not a happy ending. Many struggle with severe PTSD following their wrongful conviction, which psychologists have often compared to the trauma experienced by war veterans.
Many report significant personality changes, including becoming paranoid and anxious after their convictions; others report feelings of threat and fear when in public.
Cure’s freedom was originally taken from him in 2004 when he was convicted of armed robbery with a firearm and aggravated assault with a firearm in Dania Beach on Nov. 10, 2003. The Broward State Attorney’s Office took a second look at the case through its Conviction Review Unit. Cure was the first prison inmate exonerated by the unit.
“All I know is that someone I knew to be a person of goodwill, someone incredibly giving of himself, getting his life back together, is no longer with us because of a traffic stop,” Miller said. “What everyone is focused on now is, first and foremost, grieving for a family member.”
Information from The Associated Press was used in this report.
Rafael Olmeda can be reached at rolmeda@sunsentinel.com or 954-456-4457