In the early evening of February 23, 2022, 27-year-old Keleen Rashad Connell was shot and killed during an encounter with a Birmingham police officer in the Tom Brown Village public housing community. Officers on patrol had identified Connell, and what began as an attempt to make contact quickly turned into a foot pursuit that ended with Connell’s death. Law enforcement reported a firearm was recovered at the scene, but specific details of the altercation that led to the shooting were not released.

Connell’s mother, Erica Connell, publicly pressed for transparency and a full investigation, describing her son as a loving father and saying he was misunderstood by many. The Alabama Law Enforcement Agency took over the inquiry as the independent investigator. Connell had previously been identified by the Birmingham Police Department as a suspect in the July 2020 killing of Mikos Lewis; a warrant from that earlier case was part of his background.

Did anyone in Tom Brown Village see or hear anything relevant on February 23, 2022?