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Louise Thomas

Editor

A Georgia man who was killed by police inside a Cobb County Walgreens had his hands up, according to friends and family.

Nathain Jenkins, 32, of Valdosta, was shot in a Walgreens store late Friday night, according to the Cobb County police.

“I was on the phone with him. He FaceTimed me. He put me in his pocket,” friend Hayley Glaze told local news station 11 Alive. “Basically, the police had him cornered. They were yelling at him. He was yelling back my hands are up.

“This is uncalled for, especially if his hands were up. He stated his hands were up, and y’all still shot him," Glaze added. "There’s no way he could’ve reached for anything. He’s not like that. He’s not dumb.”

The Georgia Bureau of Investigation, which is now investigating the shooting at the request of local police, said in a statement Jenkins had “outstanding warrants” for unspecified crimes.

“During the ensuing altercation, the suspect, who was armed with a gun, was shot,” the Cobb County police said in a statement.

Darlland Jackson, Jenkins’ father, said the 32-year-old called him and said he was in some kind of unspecified trouble. Jackson said he was also on the phone with Jenkins, who had previously struggled with drug and psychological problems, during the shooting.

“Before you know it, I heard gunshots. So I drove around to this Starbucks right here and the cops were saying, ‘Get down! Get down! Get down!’ and stuff like that. Then I heard more shots, and I didn’t hear from him no more,” Jackson told local news station WSB-TV.

The Independent has contacted the Georgia Bureau of Investigation for more information.

On Saturday, friends and family of Jenkins, a father of five, gathered at the location of the shooting for a vigil.

Jackson said he still hasn’t heard from police about what happened.

"Nothing, nothing, nothing…you killed my son and now I got to wait here for you to talk to me?" he told Fox 5 Atlanta. 

Since 2016, Cobb County police fatally shot 21 people, two-thirds of them Black and Hispanic, according to a Washington Post database, in an area with a more than 50 percent white population.

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