Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: WEDNESDAY, August 16, 1995 TAG: 9508160113
SECTION: CURRENT PAGE: NRV1 EDITION: NEW RIVER VALLEY
SOURCE: KATHY LOAN STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: BLACKSBURG LENGTH: Medium
The dead man, Berman Maurice Taylor, 22, was buried Monday by family and friends.
Officer Michael Mickey, who has a bullet wound in his left thigh, was released from Montgomery Regional Hospital on Sunday. He was hit by a bullet fired by another officer while trying to arrest Taylor in a local drug store.
Taylor was shot to death after pulling a BB pistol that looks strikingly like a .45 or .50-caliber handgun.
Taylor was wanted on a bench warrant for failing to appear at a hearing charging he had violated his probation for a 1992 robbery conviction.
Funeral services for Taylor were held before an overflow crowd at McCoy Funeral Home, barely a block from the Blacksburg Police Department. Burial followed at Roselawn Memorial Gardens.
Meanwhile, state police have started an investigation of the shooting. Blacksburg Police Chief Bill Brown asked the state Friday to conduct the investigation.
Brown said last week that a preliminary investigation showed the officers followed departmental guidelines. Since turning the investigation over to state police, Brown has declined to comment on the matter.
Special Agent in Charge Roger Rector said Tuesday that the investigation has just started. State police will talk to the officers involved and to witnesses, then compile a report.
"We present our findings to the commonwealth's attorney's office for his evaluation," Rector said.
The two officers who fired at Taylor, whose names have not been released, were placed on administrative leave after the shooting.
Mickey said last week that Taylor pulled a gun after the three officers confronted him last Wednesday afternoon in the Revco drug store on South Main Street.
Mickey said he immediately grabbed Taylor by the throat and arm and began wrestling with him for the gun.
Police have said a BB pistol, which propels a projectile with compressed carbon dioxide gas, can be dangerous, even fatal.
Taylor was struck about 10 times in the neck and chest.
by CNB