LUMBERTON, N.C. — A SWAT team with the Robeson County Sheriff's Office shot Matthew Oxendine more than 30 times, killing him, Bakari Sellers, an attorney for the family, said Thursday.
Speaking on the steps of the Robeson County courthouse, Oxendine's family said the 46-year-old man was having a mental health crisis, and they had actually told deputies not to come to the house in Pembroke that January 9 night.
"He was talking about suicide," Oxendine's older brother, Chensley Oxendine, said through tears Thursday. "He was depressed and he was going through things."
Chensley Oxendine said his brother's granddaughter was born days before on January 1.
The State Bureau of Investigation investigated the case and sent a report to the district attorney's office, Sellers said, but the deputies involved are back on the job. Sellers said the deputies had no body cameras or dash cameras to capture video of the shooting.
"EMS was not who came. The fire department was not who came. Mental health professionals were not who came. The county SWAT team is who came," Sellers said.
"This man was shot more than 30 times. A mental health call turned into a gentleman being shot more than 30 times," he said.
The Robeson County Sheriff's Office, in a news release the day after the shooting, said Oxendine threatened officers. Oxendine set fire to the inside of his car and "pointed what appeared to be a firearm" at the deputies, the sheriff's office said.
Oxendine had previously served three years in prison for assaulting an officer with a weapon. He was released in 2003, the sheriff's office said.
Robeson County Sheriff Burnis Wilkins declined to comment on the case, noting he had not seen the SBI report on the shooting and is awaiting word from the district attorney's office and the state attorney general on the findings.
The sheriff told Spectrum News 1 that the deputies involved returned to work about two months after the shooting.
"I know they are having problems filling those jobs, but those officers do not need to be on duty," Sellers said.
Wilkins also confirmed that the deputies did not have cameras. "Our agency does not have body cameras but currently seeking funding to get them. I have been attempting to get funding for cameras since being in office as I am a proponent of their use," he said in an email to Spectrum News 1.
"In 2021, there were no body cameras. In 2021, there was no dash cam footage. And they rammed his vehicle as a part of the tactic before they shot him," Sellers said.
"What threat could this mental illness patient pose that would cause them to fire their weapons more than 30 times?" Attorney Chance Lynch said. "We need answers. That's why we're here.
Oxendine was in front of his cousin Hope Bullard's house when he was killed. She called him her brother.
"I told Matthew that everything would be OK, that everything was going to be alright. The law that was there, they assured me that he was going to be alright. They kept saying, 'Hope, just go back in your house,'" Bullard said.
She said she went in the house but came out several times "to see what they were waiting on."
"It was the SWAT team the whole time," she said. "They rammed my brother with a truck and came out instantly shooting."
The Oxendine family is being represented by attorneys Bakari Sellers, Chance Lynch and Attorney Chantel Cherry-Lassiter, all of whom have also been representing the family of Andrew Brown Jr., who was shot and killed by Pasquotank County deputies in April.
Sellers said his relationship with the district attorney for Robeson County, Matthew Scott has been good.
"What a difference a few miles down the road makes, because Matt Scott called me back, spoke to me," Sellers said, comparing Robeson County to the combative relationship the legal team has had with the district attorney on the Andrew Brown case in Pasquotank County.
The district attorney is reviewing the SBI report along with the North Carolina Attorney General's Office, Sellers said. There is no word yet on when the district attorney could release the findings.