Prosecutors drop charges against officers in death of Freddie Gray
Prosecutors have dropped charges against the three officers who are awaiting trial in the death of Freddie Gray, leaving the government without a single conviction in the case.
Prosecutors said on Wednesday that they will not prosecute officers Garrett Miller, William Porter and Alicia White, report the Baltimore Sun and the Washington Post. Miller and White had not yet been tried, while Porter’s case ended in a mistrial after jurors could not reach a verdict.
Three other officers have been acquitted in bench trials.
Freddie Gray died after suffering a spinal injury in a police van ride in April 2015. Prosecutors argued officers should have used a seat belt to secure Gray during the ride.
A law professor, John Banzhaf III of the George Washington University Law School, had filed ethics complaints against Baltimore City State’s Attorney Marilyn Mosby and two other prosecutors that alleged cases against the officers were not supported by probable cause.
Mosby defended her decision to charge the officers in a news conference, according to the Baltimore Sun account. She said she isn’t “anti-police” but she is “anti-police brutality.” She also said there is “inherent bias” when police investigate themselves.
“After much thought and prayer,” she said, “it has become clear that without being able to work with an independent investigatory agency from the very start, without having a say in the election of whether cases proceed in front of a judge or jury, without communal oversight of police in this community, without substantive reforms to the current criminal justice system, we could try this case 100 times and cases just like it and we would still end up with the same result.”
