'It's been 5 days': Family asks for more info after son shot, killed by Shelby Co. deputy

The family of a 21-year-old shot and killed by a Shelby County Sheriff's Department deputy during a recent traffic stop has retained notable civil rights attorney Ben Crump, community activist Kareem Ali said at a Thursday morning press conference. The family is calling for transparency from the Shelby County Sheriff's Office after the weekend altercation.

Crump now represents three Memphis families, including the family of Tyre Nichols who was beaten by officers from the Memphis Police Department in January and died days later.

Jarveon Hudspeth was pulled over by a deputy Saturday morning in Raleigh, according to law enforcement. Initial reports from Shelby County Sheriff's Office said Hudspeth got back into his car during the stop and attempted to leave the scene. The deputy was trapped in the door of the car and dragged approximately 100 yards, said Shelby County Sheriff Floyd Bonner — who is also a candidate for Memphis mayor.

At some point, the deputy fired a shot and hit Hudspeth, killing him.

The deputy was seriously injured and taken to Regional One in critical, but stable, condition.

Thursday morning, Hudspeth's mother, Charlotte Haggett, said they have not been contacted by SCSO to inform her about her son's death.

"I just want answers about my son," Haggett said through tears. "It's been five days, today, and I haven't heard one thing from the sheriff's department. I've heard not one thing from anyone. Only things that I've heard about my son is about the criminal activity. My son was never into anything criminal. Is it a crime for my son to be in a flashy car?"

Hudspeth, according to Haggett, was a student at Lipscomb University in Nashville where he was studying engineering. She said her son was interested in cars, and would do repairs on his own car when needed.

She recalled her son as hard-working, with a small circle of friends.

"He went to work every single day," she said. "He didn't hang in gangs. He wasn't in large crowds. He didn't hang out in clubs. It was him and his best friend every single weekend. Some people thought that he was a square bear because he didn't do anything."

Ali, a community activist with close ties to Crump's law firm through his activism at the start of the Tyre Nichols protests, said Hudspeth getting shot was "comparable to what the whole world witnessed in the murder and the cover-up of Tyre Nichols."

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"There has not been transparency in the matter of what actually happened to Jarveon," Ali said. "We have a narrative that Jarveon was stopped in his neighborhood for a traffic violation and that traffic violation escalated to him speeding away with a Shelby County Sheriff's deputy holding onto a vehicle...However, we don't have any video footage. We don't have any body cam footage from the deputy."

He went on to say that they "don't know if this is a cover-up or not," but said there is not enough transparency from the sheriff's department.

"Today is the day that we're calling on Sheriff Bonner to come forward with moral excellence, because we can no longer have corrupt leadership that hides and covers up situations and murders of beautiful young, Black children in our community," he said.

SCSO did not respond to a request for comment at the time this article was published.

Hudspeth's best friend, Martaveon Boone, said he is still in disbelief over his friend's death. Boone said the two were not gang-affiliated, nor affiliated with drugs and they did not cause trouble.

"To this day, it just doesn't feel real," Boone said. "I didn't just lose my best friend, I lost my brother...We went to work. We got up on our off days and kicked it. We had fun on weekends, typical 21-year-old stuff. This is hurting me more knowing that he was actually innocent — he was a good person."

Lucas Finton is a criminal justice reporter with The Commercial Appeal. He can be reached at Lucas.Finton@commercialappeal.com and followed on Twitter @LucasFinton.

This article originally appeared on Memphis Commercial Appeal: Jarveon Hudspeth's family asks for transparency from Shelby Co. Sheriff