Jury selection begins for former Harris Co. sergeant charged with murder

HOUSTON – Jury selection begins Tuesday, Oct. 22, for former Harris County Sheriff’s Sergeant Garrett Hardin, who faces murder charges in connection with the 2022 shooting death of Roderick Brooks.

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The confrontation between Hardin and Brooks was captured on body camera footage, which shows Hardin pursuing Brooks after his apparent shoplifting at a Dollar General on FM 1960.

Investigators reported that during a struggle on the ground, Brooks gained control of Hardin’s Taser, prompting the sergeant to fire his weapon.

“The facts will not change. The indictment is a joke,” Hardin’s lawyer Justin Keiter said in 2023.

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He pointed out that the video evidence would clearly show Brooks attempting to grab the Taser during the encounter. “If you watch this video closely, you will see that the suspect begins to turn around and grab the Taser.”

Lawyers representing the Brooks family also highlighted the body camera footage as a central part of the case.

“The video is going to be the centerpiece of this,” Sadiyah Evangelista-Karriem, one of the family’s lawyers, said last year.

As jury selection progresses, both sides are preparing for what promises to be a contentious trial centered on the interpretation of body camera footage and the circumstances of the confrontation between Hardin and Brooks.