A US Air Force member was fatally shot by police who entered the wrong address, a lawyer for his family says.

Senior Airman Roger Fortson, who was 23 years old, died after a deputy sheriff shot him while responding to a disturbance call.

Police earlier said the deputy reacted in self-defence after he saw Fortson armed with a gun.

Citing a witness, the lawyer alleges that police burst into the wrong home. He is demanding a full investigation.

The airman was shot on 3 May at his home, located 5 miles (8km) from the Special Operations Wing at Hurlburt Field, Florida, where he is based.

Fortson was taken to a hospital where he died, officials said.

The deputy who shot him - whom police have not named - has since been placed on administrative leave, according to a statement on Tuesday by Okaloosa County Sheriff Eric Aden.

The incident is now being investigated by the Florida Department of Law Enforcement and the State Attorney's Office, Sheriff Aden added.

"At this time, we humbly ask for our community's patience as we work to understand the facts that resulted in this tragic event," he said.

The lawyer for the Fortson family, Ben Crump, has called for transparency from the police on what transpired.

"Roger Fortson was the best America had to offer. He was a patriot. He was a US airman, special ops. He was fighting for our way of life. He was fighting for everybody," Mr Crump said at a news conference on Thursday. "They took a patriot from us."

His mother, Chantimekki Fortson, broke down crying as Mr Crump recounted the moments before the airman was shot.

"My baby was my everything," she said.

Mr Crump said at the time of the shooting Fortson was on a video call with a friend, who described what she heard to his family's legal team.

The friend said the airman heard a knock on his apartment door and asked who was there, but received no response. He then heard a second, "very aggressive knock" but did not see anyone when he looked through the peephole.

It is at this point that Fortson is said to have grown concerned and retrieved his gun, which the lawyer said was legally owned.

As Fortson returned to his living room, the witness said police burst through the door, saw that the resident was armed and shot him six times.

Mr Crump said the witness believed the officers were in the wrong apartment, as Fortson was alone at the time with no disturbance at his residence.

In a statement released on 4 May, the Okaloosa County Sheriff's Office said the deputy "reacted in self defence after he encountered a 23-year-old man armed with a gun and after the deputy had identified himself as law enforcement."

Speaking to reporters, Mr Crump accused police of trying to "justify unjustifiable excessive use of force."

Mr Crump noted that private gun ownership is allowed in the State of Florida.

The Okaloosa County Sheriff's Office has not responded to Mr Crump's comments.

Fortson was assigned to the 4th Special Operations Squadron, according to the US Air Force, and entered active duty in November 2019.

According to Mr Crump, he enlisted in the military after graduating from high school in Atlanta, Georgia with honours.

Mr Crump, a civil rights lawyer based in Florida, has worked on multiple high-profile cases of police-involved deaths of black Americans, including George

Floyd, Ahmaud Arbery, Trayvon Martin, Tyre Nichols and Breonna Taylor. (Courtesy, excluding headline, BBC)

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