Miller, who was set to stand trial Wednesday, faced charges of second-degree assault, misconduct in office and reckless endangerment, reports CBS Baltimore.
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People thought the city was in store for much worse before the young African American prosecutor Marilyn Mosby announced charges against six of the officers, causing people who had been protesting to celebrate in the streets.
Twenty-five-year-old Freddie Gray suffered severe spinal cord injuries in the back of a van in April 2015, and died a week after his arrest.
“As a mother, the decision not to proceed on the remaining trials is agonizing”, Mosby said. She clarified that she was not making the claims against the entire department, just certain members.
As police handed their investigative files over to the state attorney’s officer a day earlier than planned, supporters of the former insurance company lawyer expressed confidence in Mosby’s ability to handle the volatile case. “My office has never wavered in our commitment to seeking justice on his behalf”.
Gene Ryan, Baltimore Fraternal Order of Police president, called Mosby’s comments outrageous and untrue.
Having dropped the charges, prosecutors avoid taking the stand.
“I’m anti-police brutality. And I need not remind you that the only loss – and the greatest loss – in all of this was that of Freddie Gray’s life”, Mosby told reporters Wednesday. “She had her own agenda”.
The city’s troubles forced Mayor Stephanie Rawlings-Blake to fire her reform-minded police chief and abandon her re-election campaign.
She said the state dropped the charges when they realized it was going to be impossible to reach a conviction, pointing to a process and a system rife with “inherent bias” toward protecting the officers, regardless of their guilt or innocence. Trials for Officers Alicia White and William Porter had been scheduled for the fall. Officer William Porter had been awaiting retrial after his trial ended in a hung jury. The city became a focal point of the Black Lives Matter movement and the nationwide debate on excessive police force. The audience cheered as Mosby read out the list of criminal charges.
He died a week later on April 12, 2015. He was charged with possession of an illegal knife, but Mosby disputed that the knife he carried was large enough to break the law.
Baltimore Police Commissioner Kevin Davis says the state’s attorney’s decision to drop the remaining charges against three Baltimore police officers was a thoughtful one that will help the city forward.
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However, this judicially mandated ignorance presumably includes being unaware of Judge William’s written verdict in the Nero case which quotes and refers to Miller extensively, especially regarding the circumstances under which Gray was apprehended and put into the van. The officers also face an internal investigation.
