FL Boot Camp Guards Acquitted
Updated: A jury has acquitted eight employees of a Florida boot camp of manslaughter in the death of 14-year-old Martin Lee Anderson.
The all-white jury took about 90 minutes to deliberate in the death of the black teen, the Associated Press reports.
Anderson died last year after an altercation with guards. A surveillance video showed guards striking the limp teen with their fists and knees. Prosecutors contended the youth died when guards covered the boy’s mouth and forced him to inhale ammonia.
The defendants said the ammonia was intended to revive Anderson and that he died as a result of an undiagnosed illness.
Lawyers interviewed by the News Herald said the defense had put on a stronger case, relying on experts about boot camp procedures and medical testimony about the boy’s undiagnosed sickle cell illness. Local defense lawyer Chris Patterson said the prosecution had erred by relying on shifting theories about the cause of Anderson’s death.
Prosecutors argued that the force was excessive, that the boy suffocated, and that the defendants failed to act to help him in time. “You’ve got to pick a theory as a prosecutor and stick with it,” Patterson said.
The parents had long pushed for the prosecution after charging the state tried to cover up circumstances of the death.
On Wednesday, one of the guards was hospitalized because of stress, and family members of the dead boy experienced problems as well. The boy’s mother ran from the courtroom as the video played during a guard’s testimony, crying out, “I can’t do this,” the St. Petersburg Times reports. The same day, the judge removed the boy’s father from the courtroom after accusing him of “making noises.”
Reporters in the back of the courtroom did not hear the noises.
Updated at 1:09 PM.
