Porter, who is also black, faces charges of involuntary manslaughter, second-degree assault, misconduct in office and reckless endangerment. The trial resumes tomorrow at 9:30 a.m.
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Both videos were shown during testimony by Brandon Ross, a friend of Gray’s who was with him on the morning of his arrest and shot the second video. Thursday was the second day of Porter’s trial.
Gray, 25, died April 19 of a severe spinal injury he suffered while riding in the back of police van without a seatbelt. He said he told the officer he filmed Gray’s encounter with police and asked to talk to a supervisor.
Ross, 31, walked the jury through various videos capturing Gray’s arrest. It’s hard to distinguish who’s speaking as a voice yells, “Why are they tasing him like that?”
Prosecutors maintained Porter and the other five accused officers denied Gray medical treatment contributed to his death.
The judge overseeing the trial for one of six Baltimore police officers charged in the death of Freddie Gray says jurors have been given a tour of the police transport van where Gray suffered a critical spinal injury that killed him. The judge denied a media request to accompany the jury while it viewed the vehicle but said that no questions were asked of or by the jury during the viewing and that no information was presented to them. During the trip, the medical examiner concluded, Gray sustained a fatal spinal cord injury.
Porter said that at one stop, Gray, lying on the floor of the van, asked for help.
Porter said he didn’t call one because he assumed Gray was simply exhausted from kicking and banging the van walls. This time, Gray was in handcuffs and leaning against the van’s back platform.
Defense lawyers suggest Gray was injured from intentionally banging his head against the side of the compartment.
The chief of staff to the commissioner of the Baltimore Police Department has testified that six updated policies were sent to all agency members just days before the arrest of Freddie Gray.
Capt. Martin Bartness told jurors that he wrote the directive requiring Baltimore officers to obtain medical care for detainees when “necessary or requested”.
Jurors at the Officer William Porter trial today heard today from the defendant himself today, but not from the stand.
Prosecutors quickly focused in on a section of the course dealing with transporting people in police custody, showing through testimony that Porter learned at that time about “secure seat restraints”, or seat belts, and that they were for the safety of the person being transported. The new order leaves no ambiguity.
The defense countered by saying that Porter didn’t receive notice of the new policy until April 9, three days before Gray was transported, and there is no way of knowing whether Porter actually read the 80-page attachment that explained the new rule.
When Ross saw Gray a few minutes later, the 25-year-old was surrounded by police officers a couple of blocks away.
“Is there anywhere in that video”, asked defense attorney Gary Proctor, “that Officer Porter lays a finger on Freddie Gray?”
A large portion of the dispute in the case centers on whether at the police’s van fourth stop, at Druid Hill Avenue and Dolphin Street, Gray said he could not breathe.
Porter said he noticed Gray seemed lethargic.
The questions raised were, Whose responsibility is it to seat-belt an arrestee: the driver of the van?
Goodson, who is also charged in the case, instead picked up another prisoner before driving the van to the Western District police station.
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