(C) BoingBoing
This story was originally published by BoingBoing and is unaltered.
 . . . . . . . . . .



Charges for cop suspected of shooting self and filing false report [1]

['Rob Beschizza']

Date: 2025-10-28  

Austin Bradburn, a sheriff's deputy in Towns County, Georgia, was charged Monday with filing a false report and violating his oath of office. Bradburn claimed that he had been shot, but his injuries were determined to be self-inflicted. A grand jury is also considering an indictment of the Sheriff, Kenneth Henderson, whose belligerent behavior afterwards alarmed colleagues and led to his suspension.

After Bradburn was injured in the december 2024 incident, Henderson accosted a third officer, José Carvajal with the Hiawassee Police Department, who was the first responder to the scene.

According to body camera video obtained exclusively by Atlanta News First Investigates, Carvajal used his military training to direct the use of a tourniquet to stop the bleeding and called in a description of the suspect. The confrontation began when Henderson arrived at the scene and questioned Carvajal about handling Bradburn's gun. In the chaos of providing aid, Carvajal picked up Bradburn's weapon instead of his own. Carvajal can be seen on video putting the gun back in the holster, but other emergency personnel on scene told him to take the gun. … When Carvajal said he wouldn't touch the gun again until the Georgia Bureau of Investigation arrived, Henderson became increasingly agitated

Henderson was restrained by his own officers and is the subject of an investigation—all information discovered by Atlanta News First through the freedom of information act requests.

The Georgia Sheriffs' Association sent a letter to Kemp, requesting the governor appoint a committee "of two sheriffs and the Attorney General to investigate" Henderson's "apparent misconduct," a "high degree of unprofessionalism and possible criminal behavior which occurred in December of 2024."

Interesting how the "deputy shot himself and lied" story turns out to be an amuse-bouche before a dish of "meathead sheriff loses his shit" and we haven't even gotten to the main course of finding out what it was all about in the first place.

Here's the original report after Bradburn claimed to have been shot:

And here's the bodycam footage of Sheriff Henderson after he arrived on the scene:

[END]
---
[1] Url: https://boingboing.net/2025/10/28/charges-for-cop-suspected-of-shooting-self-and-filing-false-report.html

Published and (C) by BoingBoing
Content appears here under this condition or license: Creative Commons BY-NC-SA 3.0.

via Magical.Fish Gopher News Feeds:
gopher://magical.fish/1/feeds/news/boingboing/