Jayland Walker Shooting: Cops Not Prosecuted in Black Driver’s Death | Ohio

Ohio’s attorney general said Monday that eight police officers who fired dozens of shots at 25-year-old black man Jayland Walker will not be charged in his death after a grand jury refused to press charges. Announced.

Walker’s death last June sparked protests in Akron after police released body camera footage showing him dying in a hail of gunfire. Police said Walker opened fire from his car 40 seconds into the chase.

Police pursued the vehicle on highways and city streets, but Walker escaped from the still-moving car and fled into a parking lot, ignoring police orders, where Walker, wearing a ski mask, died. Officials said he represented a “mortal threat”. A handgun, a loaded magazine, and a wedding ring were found in the driver’s seat of his car.

Attorney General Dave Yost said Walker fired at least one shot at police from the vehicle and jumped out of the vehicle before ignoring orders to stop and show his hands. “I have no doubt he actually shot the police officer,” Yost said.

Yost said Walker reached for his waistband and raised his hand as officers pursued him. Officers didn’t know he left his gun in his car and believed he was firing again, Yost said.

Yost said it was important to remember that Walker fired at the police and that he “fired first.”

Walker’s family, who were unarmed at the time, called it the brutal and senseless shooting of a man whose fiancé had recently died. He said he believes there is, and that their actions are in line with their training and protocol.

The blurry body camera footage did not clearly show what authorities said was a threatening gesture that Walker made before he was shot. Police chased him for about 10 seconds before officers opened fire from multiple directions.

The eight officers, whose names have not been released, were initially on leave but returned to administrative duties three-and-a-half months after the shooting.

The county coroner said Walker was shot at least 40 times. An autopsy also said no illegal drugs or alcohol were detected in his body.

City leaders are meeting with community leaders, church groups, activists and business owners ahead of the grand jury meeting to prepare for possible protests.

Walker’s death received widespread attention from activists, including the family of the Reverend Martin Luther King Jr. The NAACP and Walker’s family’s attorneys have called on the Justice Department to open a federal civil rights investigation.

President Joe Biden said during a trip to Ohio last summer that the Justice Department was monitoring the case.

Separately, another grand jury has refused to indict a former police officer in northern Virginia after he shot and killed an unarmed shoplifting suspect outside a busy shopping mall in February.

Authorities have submitted the case to a grand jury for indictment against Wesley Shiflett, who shot and killed Timothy McCrea Johnson outside Tysons Corner Center on February 22.

The shooting occurred after Shiflett and another Fairfax County police officer chased Johnson on foot from the mall after receiving a report from a security guard that Johnson stole sunglasses from a Nordstrom department store.

dim body camera video Shows chasing and shooting. You can hear the officer say “Get on the ground” and then “Stop reaching” when firing. After the shooting, Shiflett told another officer that he saw Johnson “keep reaching for his waistband.”

A search of the premises after the shooting found no weapons.

Shiflett was fired last month for what Fairfax County Police Chief Kevin Davis called “failure to meet the expectations of the authorities, particularly the use of force policy.”

Johnson family lawyer compared shooting to executionAccording to Johnson’s mother, Melissa Johnson, the only reason police shot her son at the time was “suspect he was black and male and rang the alarm for sunglasses from a store.” It is said that