Six weeks after Sheriff’s Deputy Garry “Kool-Aid” Chambliss was shot to death while standing with a group of neighbors in front of a friend’s Gifford home, we still don’t know who pulled the trigger.
But someone does.
Someone in the county’s historically black community knows the identity of the gutless, gun-toting thug who fired the fatal shot from more than 100 yards away and inadvertently struck the off-duty corrections deputy, robbing two daughters of their father.
Someone either saw the shooter, or has talked with him about the shooting. Someone is a close friend or relative who knows what happened on that fateful Friday night and why.
At the very least, someone knows somebody who knows something – because, according to a Sheriff’s Office report, there was a verbal altercation at the scene, a bottle was thrown at a car and gunshots were fired in anger, all in the minutes and seconds before Chambliss went down.
Yet, all these weeks later, despite all the tears and all the community outrage over the shooting death of a beloved friend and neighbor, the killer remains at large.
Sheriff’s detectives continue to take calls and work the case. Teddy Floyd, the popular and well-connected deputy who specializes in community relations, continues to pass along leads. Gifford civic leaders continue to encourage cooperation with law enforcement.
Yet nobody – nobody able to irrefutably identify the shooter and willing to testify against him – has come forward to give detectives the evidence they need to make an arrest.
“People are providing us with information via phone calls and text messages, even coming in to talk to us,” Sheriff’s Office spokesman Maj. Eric Flowers said. “We’re also getting tips from our contacts in the community, and we’ve gotten enough information that we have a pretty good idea who did it.
“But,” he added emphatically, “we don’t have enough to prove who did it. What we need is for someone to say, ‘I saw him do it,’ or something close to it. And we don’t have that yet.”
Sheriff’s Office detectives don’t have it because the people most able to help them bring Chambliss’ killer to justice have, thus far, refused to do so.
Their reasons are varied, according to my conversations – both on the record and off – with law-enforcement officials, Gifford’s longtime civic leaders and members of that community.
Some Gifford residents feel a sense of loyalty to the shooter, I was told, because they know him and don’t want see him go to prison. Others don’t trust the legal system, particularly the Sheriff’s Office, which, until recently, hadn’t made much of an effort to embrace the county’s black communities.
There also might be some who fear retaliation from the shooter’s friends and relatives. There are others who, despite their love for Chambliss and sadness over his death, simply can’t bring themselves to help put another black man in jail.
That’s entirely understandable, given the relationship between the Gifford community and local law enforcement before Sheriff Deryl Loar was elected in 2008.
“There’s history that both sides have to overcome,” said Tony Brown, president of the county’s NAACP chapter. “There’s still some mistrust, some fear, a lack of understanding. That’s because, with previous administrations, there was no relationship with law enforcement, and there was a lot of dysfunction.
“Sheriff Loar has worked hard to reach out to the community and change that mindset,” he added, “but some people are still in denial.”
Brown, who works closely with Gifford civic leaders and pastors of the black churches in the community, wants justice for Chambliss. So does Floyd.
For those who don’t know: Both men are black.
So was Chambliss.
“I remember Victor Hart Sr. saying that there’s no crime committed in our community in which somebody didn’t see something,” Floyd said of the longtime Gifford civic and civil rights leader. “There should be 100 people coming forward to tell us what happened.
“Unfortunately, there are some people who want to make this about something else – something other than accountability, truth and justice.”
Not even Chambliss’ distant cousin, who was involved in the earlier dispute that prompted the gunplay and likely was the shooter’s intended target, would finger the trigger man.
Sheriff’s Office reports say Makhail Chambliss, 21, was arrested and charged with “felony discharge of a firearm from a vehicle” after he fired several handgun rounds into the air in response to someone throwing a bottle at his black Chevrolet Camaro.
He fired the shots from the car at about 9:30 p.m. on February 17 on the 4400 block of 28th Avenue, where he stopped and became engaged in a heated verbal exchange with someone in the crowd that had gathered across from the Mount Sinai Baptist Church, site of a wake earlier in the day.
As Makhail Chambliss and a passenger sped away, someone shot from a distance – presumably at the Camaro – and the bullet struck Garry Chambliss, who staggered 20 feet before collapsing on a driveway.
Given that detectives were told the incident was connected to an ongoing feud ignited when Makhail Chambliss was robbed two weeks prior to the shooting, it’s difficult to believe he doesn’t know who shot at him.
“Either he can’t tell us,” Flowers said of Makhail Chambliss, “or he won’t.”
My guess is he won’t . . . because he can’t. And he can’t because, for too many young black men in the Gifford community, helping the police violates some street code – some twisted sense of honor – that puts race over right.
It doesn’t matter that Garry Chambliss was a good man who was killed only because he happened to be standing in the wrong place at the wrong time. Clearly, it doesn’t matter that Gary and Makhail Chambliss were kin.
“He has to know who he was in an argument with,” Floyd said, adding that there might even be some gang-like attitudes that are preventing those in the know from talking. “We don’t have the Crips and Bloods like they do in Los Angeles, but we have a lot of wannabes in our community.”
That might explain why Makhail Chambliss won’t say anything, though it’s a pathetic excuse. But what about the others who know enough to give detectives the probable cause they need to make an arrest?
Where’s the character to do what’s right? Where’s the courage to stand up to street thugs? Where’s the compassion for Chambliss and his family?
I’m told that most of the crime problems in Gifford are being caused by young people. That’s no surprise.
Nor is this: Many of these young troublemakers, as well as those who defend them and offer excuses for their bad behavior, consider Gifford’s longtime civic leaders and black deputies like Floyd to be out of touch with life in their community.
“I’ve been called an ‘Uncle Tom’ and a ‘sellout,’ and that I’m ‘not a real black man,’ all because I wear a badge,” Floyd said. “But that’s coming from people who don’t really know me, don’t know my story, don’t know the facts.
“Sometimes, it hurts to hear it,” he added. “Sometimes, I see posts like that on Facebook and it brings tears to my eyes. Most of the time, though, it comes from people who want to do bad, anyway, so I just consider the source.
“But these people need to understand: It’s not about selling out, it’s about standing up for what’s right.”
Most Gifford residents, Brown said, want to live in a safe, peaceful, crime-free community in which they can raise their kids and flourish. Many of them, he added, live in middle-class neighborhoods.
“The good people of Gifford don’t want this crime and violence in their community,” Brown said. “Gifford has some issues that are troubling for our community, but we can’t make that the foundation for doing wrong.”
What happened to Garry Chambliss – killed for no good reason, at age 50, after 27 1/2 years of service to the Sheriff’s office – was about as wrong as it gets.
Worse, though, is knowing who pulled the trigger and staying silent.
That’s not only wrong; even if the shooter happens to be a friend or relative, it’s disgraceful and cowardly.
Certainly, Garry Chambliss deserves better. So does Gifford.
“This is a partnership,” Floyd said. “We, in law enforcement, can’t do our jobs without you. There’s a reward, but, really, we shouldn’t need one. It’s time for the people who know who did this to come forward.
“Justice cries out from the grave.”