Jamil Abdullah Al-Amin, the man convicted of killing a Fulton County deputy in 2000, died Sunday in federal custody in North Carolina. He was 82.
What’s Happening: Al-Amin died at the Federal Medical Center in Butner after what his family described as a prolonged period of severe medical decline. The Federal Bureau of Prisons confirmed his death. He had been diagnosed with multiple myeloma in 2014.
What’s Important: Al-Amin was serving a life sentence without parole for the March 16, 2000 shooting death of Fulton County Deputy Ricky Kinchen and the wounding of Deputy Aldranon English. The two deputies were attempting to serve an arrest warrant at Al-Amin’s West End Atlanta store when they were shot with a rifle and handgun. Kinchen died the next day at Grady Memorial Hospital at age 35.
Between the Lines: Deputy English survived his wounds and identified Al-Amin as the shooter during the 2002 trial. A jury that included nine Black members convicted Al-Amin on all 13 counts after 10 hours of deliberation over two days. Al-Amin never testified in his own defense.
Catch Up Quick: Al-Amin was better known in the 1960s as H. Rap Brown, when he served as chairman of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee and as the Black Panther Party’s minister of justice. He converted to Islam while serving time in prison in the 1970s for an unrelated conviction and changed his name. After his release in 1976, he moved to Atlanta and became an imam, opening a grocery store and mosque in the West End neighborhood.
The Big Picture: Al-Amin maintained his innocence throughout his 23 years in prison. His legal team and the Innocence Project filed a motion for a new trial in May 2025, citing newly discovered evidence and constitutional violations. The 11th Circuit Court of Appeals previously found that prosecutors violated Al-Amin’s Fifth Amendment rights during closing arguments, but said they could not provide relief.
Al-Amin was arrested four days after the shooting in White Hall, Alabama. He was wearing body armor and showed no wounds, though Deputy English testified the shooter had been hit. A 9mm handgun found near his arrest site matched the bullets that hit both deputies, but Al-Amin’s fingerprints were not on the weapon.
The Sources: Federal Bureau of Prisons, Davis Bozeman Johnson Law.
B.T. Clark
B.T. Clark is an award-winning journalist and the Publisher of The Georgia Sun. He has 25 years of experience in journalism and served as Managing Editor of Neighbor Newspapers in metro Atlanta for 15 years and Digital Director at Times-Journal Inc. for 8 years. His work has appeared in several newspapers throughout the state including Neighbor Newspapers, The Cherokee Tribune and The Marietta Daily Journal. He is a Georgia native and a fifth-generation Georgian.
