A Florida police officer has been fired for jumping up on stage during a Vital Remains show in Orlando and shouting “let the killing begin” — in the same town where Trayvon Martin was shot and killed back in 2012.
Sanford cop Andrew Ricks, who had been on the force for six years without incident, jumped on the West End Trading Company stage with the Providence metal band on November 13 and belted out the devil horns and the intro to Vital Remains’ song “Dechristianize.” He was on duty and in uniform.
A video of the performance soon circulated online, and Ricks was fired soon after.
“An incident of this nature erodes the thin fibers of trust which already exist between the community and the police and it will not tolerated within the Sanford Police Department,” says Sanford Police Chief Cecil Smith in a statement.
In 2012, 17-year-old Trayvon Martin was fatally shot in Sanford by neighborhood watch volunteer George Zimmerman.
Ricks, who reportedly had already handed in his resignation in October and planned to leave the department on November 20, has not commented on the incident. According to Lambgoat, Vital Remains frontman Brian Werner defended the cop. “This is exactly what’s wrong with the world today,” Werner says.
Watch video of Ricks’ brief cameo with Vital Remains below…