But the judge said prosecutors can’t use Rice’s in-service training records – a trove of 4,000 pages police recently handed over – because prosecutors failed to share them with the defense team soon enough.
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The judge refused a defense request to dismiss the case entirely.
“We believe that a combination of training and [general] orders would’ve alerted the defendant that the conduct he engaged in was not within the scope” of proper officer conduct, said Chief Deputy State’s Attorney Michael Schatzow, according to the Sun. Schatzow said prosecutors did not want to seek a subpoena.
Officers’ training has been a key component of the State’s Attorney’s Office’s case against the officers, showing that they acted against the Police Department’s guidelines.
“As with all requests for documents from the SAO, the BPD worked diligently to provide a timely and thorough response in this case”.
“The court is satisfied that the charge as presented in the indictment is legally sufficient”, Williams said. Jury selection, should Rice opt for a jury trial, is slated to begin Wednesday.
“Unless the state can prove beyond a reasonable doubt that Lieutenant Rice, being a supervisor, had a better understanding of the risks of not restraining Freddie Gray than the van driver, then the state very likely will fail to convict him as well”, Alperstein said. The next two officers let Williams alone decide their fates, and he acquitted both.
The motions hearing continues right now.
There have been three trials and so far three failed prosecutions in the case against six Baltimore police officers charged in the death of Freddie Gray, a 25-year-old black man who died in police custody last year.
It was Lt. Rice who first observed Freddie Gray flee from the scene of increased police drug enforcement in the high crime neighborhood in Baltimore’s 7th District, behavior that justified officers in pursing and stopping Gray.
University of Maryland law professor Doug Colbert, who has followed the case closely, said he expects prosecutors in Rice’s trial to focus on what a “reasonable officer” would have done differently in Rice’s position. Among possible course of action, the state could have moved up the chain of command by contacting supervisors or filing for subpoenas, Williams said. Rice has pleaded not-guilty on all counts. Porter will be retried in September.
During a pretrial hearing Tuesday, Williams denied the defense’s motion to dismiss charges based on defective prosecution.
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The charges against the six officers varied from misconduct in office, assault and manslaughter to depraved-heart murder, a form of second-degree murder.
