Political, Public Pressure to Prosecute in Brooklyn “Accidental” Police Shooting of Black Man in Dark Stairwell

Associated Press reports on some political pressure to actually
hold accountable legally the police office Peter Liang who
shot and killed 28-year-old Akai Gurley in the dark stairwell
of a Brooklyn housing project. By police accounts, the officer and
his partner were not investigating any specific violent crime,
merely on patrol.

NYPD Commissioner William Bratton described the killing as
“accidental” but doesn’t seem to be claiming the gun went
off by, say, the officer accidentally dropping it.

The officer, the facts of how guns work suggest, had drawn his
gun, had his finger on the trigger, and pulled it, in the direction
of things and people he could not see and said nothing to, by
available accounts of the killing. This makes “accident” a perhaps
infelicitous way to describe what happened, even if Liang did not
knowingly and willingly intend to kill Gurley, who had done nothing
criminal or threatening prior to the killing.

After the city’s medical examiner’s office declared the incident
a “homicide”—merely meaning the death of a human caused by the
action of another human being, not in itself with any specific
legal implications—local politicians are calling for more action
than just a shrug and an “it was an accident,”
Associated Press reports:

City Councilwoman Inez Barron and Assemblyman-elect Charles
Barron met with officials in the Brooklyn district attorney’s
office on Monday. Afterward, Charles Barron told reporters he
thought the shooting of Akai Gurley last week warrants a criminal
charge for Officer Peter Liang.

He said Liang’s use of a police weapon “was reckless
endangerment, it was criminally negligent homicide.”

Whether charges are filed would be up to Brooklyn District
Attorney Kenneth Thompson, who has called the shooting “deeply
troubling” and said it warrants “an immediate, fair and thorough
investigation.” His office did not immediately respond to a request
for comment on Monday….

Liang, 26, has been placed on modified duty. Under standard
policy, police internal affairs investigators won’t be able to
question him until prosecutors have decided whether to file
criminal charges.