Newly released 911 calls reveal details in Cecil Brockman’s criminal case
Newly public 911 phone calls obtained by The News & Observer reveal more details on the criminal case involving former North Carolina Rep. Cecil Brockman, who was charged with sex crimes with a minor.
In a previously unreleased recording of a 911 call placed on Oct. 5, Brockman told the dispatcher that he was trying to get in contact with his “friend,” who was walking down Old Greensboro Road in Thomasville, which is near High Point.
“I’m trying to find him,” Brockman said.
That 911 call, alongside another placed by a bystander who saw the teenager while driving, would end up drawing the attention of criminal investigators, who arrested Brockman later that week and charged him with two counts each of indecent liberties with a child and statutory sex offense with a person who is 15 years old or younger.
The “friend” Brockman mentions in the call was actually a 15-year-old with whom he was having an illegal relationship, Guilford County District Attorney Avery Crump would later say.
Brockman, a High Point Democrat who resigned from his seat in the legislature in October, has said that he was not aware of the teenager’s real age and believed him to be an adult. Crump disputes that claim and says the prosecution has evidence that shows Brockman knew the alleged victim was a minor.
Upon finding him on the road, authorities brought the alleged victim to the hospital due to the condition he was in, Crump said in court last month. She declined to provide details publicly, telling the judge it was confidential medical information.
A 911 call from a bystander, which authorities received prior to Brockman’s call, described seeing someone “slumped over” standing in the middle of the road.
“He almost walked in front of three people, almost got hit,” the caller said in a recording obtained by The N&O.
The N&O made a public records request for calls Oct. 10 and revised it Nov. 4. Davidson County responded on Nov. 20 to say the records were not available because of an ongoing investigation. But after an attorney for The N&O reminded the county this month that state public records law does not allow for withholding 911 call recordings because of an investigation, the county attorney provided the records Wednesday.
Once the teenager was in the hospital, Crump said Brockman made multiple attempts to gain access to him. She alleged he did so with the intent of retrieving the individual’s phone and deleting any evidence of their relationship.
Brockman’s attorney, Alec Carpenter, denied this claim, saying his client only went to the hospital because “he cared very much about this person.”
A trial date has not yet been scheduled in Brockman’s case. Last month, he was released on bond after a judge significantly lowered his bail amount.
