Katie de la Rosa

Soon, members of the Mason family will learn if the winding road they've been traveling for the past three years will lead to some answers, maybe some closure, or even some peace.

Truthfully, though, what they want is justice.

And that could come any day now, as the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals is expected to soon announce its decision on whether to send the family's lawsuit against the Lafayette Police Department and Cpl. Martin Faul back to federal district court.

On. Dec. 9, 2011, Faul shot and killed Quamaine "Dee" Mason.

In January 2012, the Masons said, the Lafayette Police Department and Louisiana State Police became totally uncooperative with them.

In July 2012, a Lafayette Parish grand jury declined to indict Faul.

In December 2013, Judge Richard Haik dismissed the Masons' lawsuit without a trial.

In what could be the final stretch of their arduous journey, the Masons have more endurance than ever. They've been striving for what they feel is redemption for the 21-year-old criminal justice major who they believe was killed without justification.

"They picked the wrong family to kill a member of," said Bryant Riggs, a cousin of Quamaine Mason. "We don't give up. We never give up."

What's in question is what transpired after Mason and his girlfriend, Raquel Babino, encountered three police officers and a K9 unit outside her Campus Crossings apartment.

Mason would die roughly 30 seconds later. But it began about 10 minutes before they opened her front door.

Witness statements

According to Babino's statements to lawyers and private investigators, she, her child's father, Paul Pitkins, and his cousin Jeremy Richardson were hiding in her locked bedroom. In her interview, roommate Doneisha Atkinson says Mason "was knocking hard but not banging" on the front door, there to retrieve his dog. He became irate after noticing through her bedroom window that Babino was in there with two men.

Babino asked Atkinson and fellow roommate Da'Traenea King to hand Mason the dog through the door, but he walked into the apartment. Mason threatened to pistol-whip the men and attempted to open the bedroom door. Hiding in the closet, Richardson called 911.

Finally, Babino opened the door, and Mason "guided" the two men to the door and put away his gun.

He was trying to calm down, Babino says, and King gave him a water bottle after he opened the refrigerator and joked that "those boys must have stole my beer."

When Mason noticed the dog was gone, he and Babino headed out the door to look for it. Instead, Babino says, they found three guns and a K9 unit pointed right at them.

Police statements

When Faul arrived at the apartment, according to his video interview with state police, he "swung high," perching himself in the grass to the right of Babino's front door and across from her window. He directed officers Brittney Dugas and Jace Galland, who arrived to the scene at the same time, to follow behind. They were positioned in front of the door.

After the door opened, Faul said, Mason stood "slick" behind Babino, who shielded him from the other officers' view (in her statement, Babino says she did jump in front of him and Dugas says Babino did block her from a clear shot at Mason). Mason stepped aside to "square off" with Faul and assumed a fighting posture, Faul said. In the video, Faul clinches his fists like a boxer, then says, "but his hands weren't up here."

"He had this weird look in his eyes," Faul said.

Faul said Mason "raised (his right hand) up toward the gun." When he saw it, Faul said, he yelled, "gun!" and released the K9 named Wodan. The dog attacked without Faul having issued any verbal warnings, which is a violation of Commission on Accreditation for Law Enforcement Agencies canine standards. Faul said he couldn't remove the leash from his wrist, which he described as "a nightmare" because the dog pulled him toward Mason. That's when, Faul said, he looked "for where (he) wanted the rounds to hit" and "assessed" the situation.

"I just started shooting," Faul told state police.

Once on the ground, Faul said, Mason "went to spin," as if to reach for the gun again.

"So, I shot two more times," he said. "He quit moving."

The lawsuit

"It's not about the money," said Brenda Mason, Quamaine Mason's mother, about the lawsuit.

Riggs, Mason's cousin, said he's "cautiously optimistic" the appeals court in New Orleans will rule in their favor.

"We're a family that believes in the justice system, but it already failed us once," he said.

In the months following Mason's death, Riggs said neither Lafayette police nor state police provided the family with information. When the family went to the hospital, they were not allowed to see Mason's body.

"It wasn't until the funeral home called me asking if we wanted an open casket that I learned he had been shot in the chin," Brenda Mason said.

Weeks later, the family was able to sit down with state police in a meeting Riggs called "condescending."

"They said, 'If (Lafayette police) were going to set up your cousin, don't you think they would have taken his gun and fired shots to make it look like he was shooting at them?' Riggs recalled.

Becoming a police officer is what Mason always wanted, Brenda Mason said, which is why they don't believe he reached for his gun — for which he legally held a Louisiana concealed permit.

"He would never have done anything to jeopardize that," his mother said.

Differing officer accounts

On Tuesday, Lafayette Police Chief Jim Craft had no comment regarding the upcoming appeals court decision.

But in an Internal Affairs review dated Jan. 10, 2012, Craft wrote "the armed suspect failed to comply with police verbal commands, reached for weapon, resisted K-9 deployment." Based on that "rapid evolvement and tense situation," Craft wrote, Faul was "justified" in "neutralizing the threat."

Dugas and Galland, in their statements to detectives, provided different accounts.

Dugas says Mason raised his hands, but then he put them back down and turned toward Faul. That's when Faul simultaneously yelled, "Gun!" released the K9 and started shooting, she said.

In her re-enactment, however, Dugas said Mason never dropped his raised hands. Only when he turned did she see his right elbow bend, as if reaching for his gun. Dugas re-enacts his body flying against the wall and hunching over as he getting was shot.

Galland says he "noticed what looked like a gun" on Mason's side as soon as he walked out the door, the same moment Faul yelled "gun!" He doesn't remember Mason ever looking in his direction. Mason still had his hands up, with his back toward the bedroom window facing Faul, when Galland says Mason started lowering his right hand and Faul started firing.

According to department policy, an officer involved in a shooting "should be afforded at least two sleep cycles" before being questioned. State police interviewed Dugas and Galland on Dec. 12. Faul was interviewed on Dec. 21.

Autopsy

The order in which the eight shots were fired can't be determined, according to the autopsy, and none of the seven that struck Mason exited his body.

The family argues the shots that the 5-foot-7 Faul fired into the 6-foot-2 Mason's right and left triceps prove Mason's hands were up.

One bullet entered his right triceps, fractured his humerus, exited through his right bicep and then re-entered his right chest. The trajectory was right to left, "slightly front and slightly downward." The shot to the left triceps followed the same trajectory and caused the same injuries as the shot to the right triceps.

The autopsy says the shot to left triceps was "consistent with the arm being raised," but says nothing about the shot to the right triceps, which was identically injured. It offers no possible position of Mason's right arm when it was shot.

A family's faith

Mason's father, Billy Mason, believes he'll one day be able to forgive. But the former military police investigator and current barber living in Oklahoma City said he may never forgive himself.

Two nights before his youngest son was killed, Billy Mason was on the phone with him while cutting a customer's hair. He needed to concentrate, so he promised to call Mason back. But he forgot.

"You never hang up on someone thinking it'll be the last time you ever talk to them," the father said.

The family knows they can't bring Mason back with the lawsuit, which they insisted isn't an attack on police as a whole. Billy Mason believes most officers are noble and honorable. But he wants justice for the bad ones.

Still, even if the appeals court rules against them, Billy Mason is confident "Quamaine died for a reason.

"My son can protect all the other Quamaines in danger," he said. "This case can open the public's eyes to see what's happening out there."