Posted on 12/10/2017 10:03:51 AM PST by E. Pluribus Unum
A Maricopa County jury on Thursday found former Mesa police Officer Philip “Mitch” Brailsford not guilty of second-degree murder charges in the 2016 shooting of an unarmed Texas man who was on his knees begging for his life.
Jurors deliberated for less than six hours over two days, finishing Thursday afternoon. The eight-member jury also found Brailsford not guilty of the lesser charge of reckless manslaughter.
The packed courtroom in Maricopa County Superior Court was quiet after one of Judge George Foster’s clerks read the verdict.
Brailsford was one of two officers in Arizona since 2005 who had been charged with murder in connection with an on-duty shooting.
The case ends during a time when on-duty police shootings have received heightened scrutiny. Some shootings, particularly those recorded on video, have prompted protests throughout the U.S.
Mesa police have released footage from Officer Philip “Mitch” Brailsford’s body camera of the fatal shooting of an unarmed Texas man at a hotel in 2016. This edited video shows the moments leading up Daniel Shaver’s death. Mesa Police Department
Brailsford’s acquittal came after impassioned closing arguments that offered contrasting narratives of why Brailsford shot and killed 26-year-old Daniel Shaver in a hotel hallway two years ago.
Shaver was kneeling, crying and begging not to be shot after he was confronted by six Mesa police officers in a La Quinta Inn & Suites hallway Jan. 18, 2016. Brailsford, who was fired two months after the shooting, testified that he fired his AR-15 rifle five times because it appeared Shaver was reaching for a gun.
“If this situation happened exactly as it did that time, I would have done the same thing,” Brailsford said in his testimony.
Laney Sweet, Shaver’s widow, said she had no comment to make about the verdict as, crying, she exited an elevator with family.
Mark Geragos, Sweet’s lawyer, called the shooting an “execution.”
“The justice system miserably failed Daniel (Shaver) and his family,” Geragos said.
Brailsford’s lawyer, Michael Piccarreta, said he had expected the jury would come back with a positive outcome for his client.
“We had confidence that the jury would recognize this as a tragedy, not a murder, and that Mitch Brailsford acted in a split-second as he was trained,” he said.
After the verdict, Brailsford and his family were escorted by a Maricopa County sheriff’s deputy out of the courtroom through a back door.
Footage of shooting, captured on two police on-body cameras, formed the foundation of the prosecution’s case. The judge did not allow jurors to hear about an etching on the dust cover of the rifle Brailsford used to shoot Shaver, which said “You’re f–ked,” because he felt it was prejudicial.
Throughout the trial, which began in late October, Deputy County Attorney Susie Charbel portrayed Brailsford as a “killer” who claimed he feared for his life to cover up an unjustified shooting.
In her closing arguments, Charbel told the jury that an intoxicated Shaver looked “pathetic” before he was killed and didn’t get a chance to know who shot him.
“(Brailsford) doesn’t get a pass because he was wearing a police uniform that night,” Charbel said.
Piccarreta said Brailsford followed the tactics of a well-trained officer. If jurors believe the training is wrong, he said, that’s not something Brailsford should be accountable for.
Piccarreta said Brailsford shot Shaver because he was protecting himself, five other officers and a woman police had taken into custody.
“The last thing in the world that Mitch Brailsford wanted to do that night was shoot. His goal wasn’t to kill Daniel Shaver,” Piccarreta told the jury. “Shaver is not a bad person, but his actions are what brought the police that night.”
YouTube Video: Execution of Daniel Shaver
No, when he was proned out, hands empty, one of the 6 officers could have safely cuffed him as he was covered by the others.
Two, he wasn’t a “perp” you moron. Shaver had committed no crime whatsoever.
It was depraved mind murder.
You are a liar. Offer proof it was murder or that label sticks to you like white on rice.
Simply a shorthand way of describing him that you are trying to use to distract from the main point that this was a justifiable shooting because you have nothing to counter the juries verdict with.
Looks like the guy cooperated.
The dead man was not a perpetrator of anything and was shot to death by a wussy little poseur with an AR-15 playing a warped game of Simon Says. I’d call it Kafkaesque but it’s just too damned stupid to rise to even that low bar. Yet, here you are, mouthing cop good “perp” bad like some mangy parrot. Careful, you might forget to breathe.
He was going to ambush six police officers who had their guns aimed at him with a pellet gun that was in his room?
Soldiers (admittedly nazi) have been convicted and punished severely for war crimes because reasonable people didn't accept the “I was just following orders” argument. Of course in the soldiers’ defense, the consequences for not following orders was harsh to the extreme.
Is this one instance of overreaction a crime against humanity? Maybe not, but to me allowing/promoting the untempered authoritarianism that was displayed by the officer in the video allows those attitudes to increase and results in more “unfortunate circumstances”.
How would you feel if your newly launched adult child didn't yet have the wherewithal to control his/herself sufficiently to satisfy the whims of a power-happy bureaucrat with a gun and died? Would you say “well, s/he never did well under pressure, it was bound to happen”? Or would you be outraged and begin or continue to consider those in such positions and above enemies of your family and community?
This, I believe, is a part of the anger that has been leveraged by the left to divide a country that once believed and lived by “E Pluribus Unum”.
I believe many U.S. citizens have lost their moral compass and have no ability to discern right from wrong.
If cops are allowed to feel NO remorse for such actions, we are following in the footsteps of the nazis.
I’ll make up my mind after I read a full and fair summary of the Defense case.
There was more than enough time for the back up police to have handcuffed him, as he was completely neutralized, and diffused the situation. It is clear the cop was getting off on a power trip with all the commands, like showing off. It reminded me of a trainer making an animal jump through hoops.
Anybody who is that frightened shouldn’t be police.
Sadly, this verdict supports the position of groups that hate cops.
Shaver thought it was a laughing matter, and failed to follow instructions to the “T” when told to do so, and the consequences for not doing so. However, the cop should be executed. Incredible.
Totally and completely unnecessary shooting.
Hope this cop dies drunk in the gutter in his own waste.
“I beleive in the rule of law, not the rule of anonymous people who weren’t on the jury watching online videos.”
So you believe the OJ jury?
> the perp made movements that he may have been armed <
Joe, we can’t let that be the new standard. A citizen under stress might make all sorts of unwise movements. For example, suppose the cops are looking for an armed bank robber. I’m not the robber. But I fit the description.
A cop sees me on the street and yells for me to stop. I reach in my pocket, maybe for my ID or my cellphone. Or maybe for a stick of gum. Or maybe to scratch my leg. I just made a motion that might be interpreted as going for a gun. Would the cop be justified in shooting me?
I would have to say no. A motion does not justify a shooting. If a cop does not see a gun, he must not shoot. Juries have disagreed with that. And that’s one reason (among many) we no longer live in a free society.
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