According to the Associated Press, prosecutors in Tulsa, Oklahoma have announced first-degree manslaughter charges against Betty Shelby, the officer who fatally shot 40-year old Terence Crutcher just last week.
The AP notes that, "among the definitions in Oklahoma for first-degree manslaughter is a killing "perpetrated unnecessarily either while resisting an attempt by the person killed to commit a crime, or after such attempt shall have failed.""
Tulsa County District Attorney Steve Kunzweiler filed the charges against Shelby and has said that arrangements were being made for her to surrender.
"I do not know why things happen in this world the way they do," Kunzweiler said, adding that he determined first-degree manslaughter the appropriate charge. "We need to pray for wisdom and guidance."
Video footage from a police dashboard as well as a helicopter showed Shelby, a five year veteran of the Tulsa police force, opening fire on Crutcher while he was being tased by another officer just outside of his vehicle.
After the horrific incident, Tulsa’s police chief, Chuck Jordan, announced that Terence Crutcher was unarmed and did not have a weapon inside the vehicle that he was leaning on. Shelby's lawyer, Scott Wood, contested that she thought Crutcher had a weapon on him and that he acted erratically, refused to comply with several orders, tried to put his hand in his pocket and reached inside his car window before he was fatally shot.
If convicted, she could face a minimum of four years in prison.
[Via]
