im not a lawyer, but i read a lot of law blogs yesterday. and some quite liberal lawyers made the argument that juries allow wide latitude to police officers on deadly force issues. (they’re liberal so they didn’t like it).
the standard is serious risk of physical harm. and they are going to try to portray
Scott as posing that risk.
They do, because in most cases all they have is the word of the police officer that he believed his life, or the life or safety of others, was in danger and he had to resort to deadly force. In this case it is clear that neither the police officer or anyone else was in any danger whatsoever when he fired 8 shots at the fleeing suspect. I can't see the jury taking the BS account of the police officer over their own eyes.
the standard is serious risk of physical harm. and they are going to try to portray Scott as posing that risk.
And that will be darned near impossible, given the video as well as the lack of any sign of injury to the officer.