He now faces up to 10 years in prison, although the jury recommended just 2 1/2 years.
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A jury has found Stephen Rankin guilty of voluntary manslaughter in the death of William Chapman. Still, it is staggering that a man who was originally facing a first-degree murder charge could now be heading to prison for under three years – far less if he maintains good behavior behind bars.
“I think this is a awful tragedy I wish had never happened”. I wish it had never happened. “I can’t begin to fathom how much pain that family is going through after losing a loved one”. “I wish I could have done more to keep him alive”, he added. No video recorded the actual killing, and testimony conflicted on the details. Ms Morales said that Chapman should have faced prosecution for allegedly resisting arrest.
Rankin responded with two shots, striking Chapman in the chest and the face. He weighed 187 pounds with his clothes on, and Rankin said he weighed 160 pounds at the time.
Rankin “brought a gun to what at worst was a fistfight”, argued Portsmouth commonwealth attorney Stephanie Morales.
The jury, eight black and four white, did not convict on the first-degree murder charge prosecutors had sought.
Rankin said he calmly approached Chapman to discuss the shoplifting accusation and was preparing to handcuff him when the teen refused to comply with his orders and a struggle ensued.
The defence said Rankin had to shoot after a stun gun failed to stop the teenager.
Rankin acknowledged that he drew his weapon and ordered Chapman to “get to the ground”. He claimed that the teen started screaming, “Shoot me”, before charging him from about 6 feet away, ABC reports. He said he experienced “tunnel vision” at that point, and fearing for his life, fired twice to stop him. “I wish none of it had ever occurred”, said Rankin after being found guilty. It was the second time Rankin had fatally shot an unarmed man in his career.
Earlier Thursday in Baltimore, a 15-year veteran officer was convicted of assault for shooting an unarmed burglary suspect in 2014, and his police commissioner was taking steps to fire him.
Rankin said Denyakin, 26, reached into his waistband and charged at the officer during a confrontation outside an apartment building where Denyakin was banging loudly on a door. A judge cannot increase the jury’s recommended sentence, but he could reduce it.
“What we see over and over in the videos is that the videos contradict the narratives given immediately after shooting by police on the scene and that officers involved in these unjustified shootings are not acting in ways consistent with their training”, he said.
As Huffington Post notes, “the overwhelming majority of police shooting cases are ultimately determined to be justified homicides, in which deadly force was used lawfully, often in what police say was an effort to protect an officer’s safety or to prevent harm to the public”.
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The jurors were not informed, however, that the former officer had previously shot and killed an unarmed Kazakh hotel cook, Kirill Ivanovich Denyakin, four years prior to the night that Chapman was slain.
