A former Baltimore police officer who served with all six of the officers charged in the Freddie Gray case told Fox News Wednesday night that he thought State’s Attorney Marilyn Mosby would “absolutely” order a retrial after a mistrial was declared earlier in the day.
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Jurors deliberated for three days over whether Porter committed manslaughter, assault, reckless endangerment and misconduct in office.
Gray suffered neck and spinal cord injuries while in the back of a police van on April 12. Prosecutors and defense attorneys for the officer, William Porter, were set to meet in private with Baltimore City Circuit Judge Barry Williams to discuss the new trial date, Reuters reported.
It followed the police killings of black men in cities including Ferguson, Missouri, and NY, which sparked the Black Lives Matter movement. Porter was facing a total of 25 years in prison and it is not certain if he will return to court in the future for another trial.
Prosecutors said Porter ignored Gray’s pleas for medical help and abused his power as a police officer. Prosecutors said they won’t retry the white officer for voluntary manslaughter in the September 2013 shooting death of Jonathan Ferrell, who was unarmed. Porter admitted in testimony last week he did not immediately call for a medic when Gray initially asked for help during one of the stops.
Attorney Billy Murphy, who obtained a $6.4 million settlement for Gray’s family, called the mistrial “a temporary bump on the road to justice”. After court adjourned, Porter conferred solemnly with defense attorney Joseph Murtha, then walked from the courtroom ahead of his lawyers. Judge Williams instructed the jury that to find Porter guilty of involuntary manslaughter it would have to conclude, beyond a reasonable doubt, that Porter acted in a “grossly negligent manner” and that his conduct was a “gross departure” from what a “reasonable police officer” in a similar situation would do.
Mosby was in court when the mistrial was declared and looked visibly upset. The prosecutors have said they plan on retrying Officer William G. Porter, and given that there are five more officers to be tried after Porter, this saga is far from over.
“We are confident there will be another trial with a different jury”, said Gray’s stepfather, Richard Shipley.
“In some ways, a hung jury might be better than an acquittal”, Deray McKesson, a prominent USA civil rights activist, said on Twitter. The police department canceled leave for all officers this week while Rawlings-Blake opened an emergency operations center and pleaded for calm.
Yahoo News reveals that the mistrial was the first hearing of six overall, with five other police officers also facing charges that led to Gray’s death.
Mayor Stephanie Rawlings-Blake appeared with Baltimore Police Commissioner Kevin Davis, saying that lawful protests would be allowed. When it was all said and done, 250 people were arrested and a state of emergency was declared in Baltimore.
“It’s very sad”, she told CNN, “because I think that everybody was very happy that police got indicted, and not to get a conviction is painful”.
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“I’m not expecting our community to repeat April”, said Erika Alston, a community leader who runs an afterschool program in West Baltimore.
