You knew it had to happen. The family of cell tower worker Anthony Wayne Furr has filed a negligent death lawsuit against the city of Charlotte. Contrary to the city’s repeated assertions, there are still serious questions about what happened that July night.

They start with the fact that the 911 call which drew three CMPD officiers to the site off of Albemarle Road claimed several unauthorized persons had repeatedly been asked to leave the area. That was not true, could not have been true as Furr was alone. So from the very beginning the call was operating on bad info. We still do not know exactly how officers proceeded from there on out.

We still do not know exactly where the other two officers were and what they saw and heard while Officer Anthony Payne entered the cell tower shed. The city’s investigation into the incident could have sought to answer these basic questions. But instead, from the very outset, the city and CMPD sought first to justify the shooting rather than determine what led up to it.

As a result a costly and painful lawsuit will now wind through the courts. It did not have to be this way.

Bonus observation: Why do city attorneys think it is relevant that the Furr family did not opt to appeal the city’s official findings to the Citizen Review Board? The board has no power. It could not, for example, ask that polygraphs be given to those officers involved.