BOISE — The Idaho Attorney General’s Office will not file charges against four Pocatello police officers who shot a teenager with developmental disabilities this spring.
The officers fired 14 times in fewer than two seconds, with 12 of the bullets hitting 17-year-old Victor Perez. The police were called to his home on April 5 for a report of a disturbance. The teenager died a week later after doctors amputated his leg and he was clinically declared brain dead.
The shooting garnered attention from around the world. Cell phone video of the incident has been viewed millions of times, and protests have been held across the state with participants demanding justice for Perez. Members of the community expressed outrage at City Council meetings and demanded the officers be arrested and charged.
The Eastern Idaho Critical Incident Task Force investigated the shooting, and Bannock County Prosecuting Attorney Ian Johnson asked the office of Idaho Attorney General Raúl Labrador to determine whether criminal charges should be filed.
In a 12-page letter sent to Johnson on Wednesday morning, Idaho Deputy Attorney General Jeff Nye acknowledged the shooting was a tragedy and explained why the officers will not be charged.
“The State would be unable to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that the four officers who discharged their weapons were not justified in using deadly force,” Nye wrote. “We will thus not file criminal charges against the officers.”
“Police performed life-saving measures…”
Yeah sure, first unload your guns and then try to resurrect him?
90% of this article is justifying the cops behaviour. Media keeps backing the cops and blaming victims, this needs to stop.
The State would be unable to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that the four officers who discharged their weapons were not justified in using deadly force,” Nye wrote.
Could you just maybe try though? Just try?
I’m pretty sure it’s the job of the jury to decide that.
I feel like it’s backwards. surely they should prove firing their weapons was justified and needed?
When legal justice fails, vigilantism becomes the only alternative.
I look forward to reading about your heroic acts.
Don’t worry. It will be on Faux News but the talking points will be different.
“Following the Eastern Idaho Critical Incident Task Force investigation, the Attorney General’s Office conducted 15 additional interviews. The officers involved in the shooting spoke with the task force but declined to be interviewed by AG investigators.
“Instead, they provided audio recordings and transcripts of interviews they completed with a third party,” Nye wrote.”
Well I hope if I’m ever involved in a controversial shooting and the AG asks to interview me I can just be like “no thanks bro, here’s a tape of my friend asking me about it” and that’s the end of it
Fun Fact:
As soon as there is any incident, LEOs are immediately cloistered with their union reps who carefully craft and modify every word of their reports.
Crazy how cops are the only workforce left that’s still allowed to unionize.
Really makes you think
Especially since it’s the only job that shouldn’t be allowed to organize, since cops are enforcers for the owner class, not labor.
Not being to prove beyond reasonable doubt does not appear to stop the government from going after everyday citizens
Some pigs are more equal than others.
Some of those who work forces, are the same that burn crosses
Yeah I don’t see how this wouldn’t be grounds to not place most murder charges. We don’t think we can prove beyond a reasonable doubt that they didn’t pose a threat to the shooters well being, and thus it was their legal right to defend themselves so we aren’t bringing charges.
No jury, the people have no say
The 911 dispatcher requested that four officers respond, more than usual for a typical disturbance. The only information the officers had was what was relayed to them from the dispatcher. They did not hear the actual 911 call and were unaware of Perez’s disabilities or age.
None of the officers were given an address for the disturbance prior to arriving at the scene, according to Nye, and dispatch was working off the information provided by the 911 caller who said the address was “behind 702 North Main.” Perez’s residence was on North Harrison.
Officers from the Pocatello Police Department had responded to Perez’s home in the past, but none of them were present at the time of the shooting. Nye said AG investigators learned during the follow-up investigation that the Pocatello Police Department does not flag residences for mental health issues. Even though police had responded to calls involving Perez and his mental health before April 5, the home was not flagged in a system.
One of the cops had a bean bag gun. Instead of giving that a try before the deadly hail of gunfire, they all unloaded simultaneously.
I don’t want to play this shitty game anymore. Is there anywhere else to go?
If I was American, I’d absolutely, positively be pulling all nighters to find a way to emigrate.
Being in Canada, I’m already working on plans to leave. I’m not getting stuck here if absolute power seeking dude who talks about taking Canada and Greenland (and gets caught trying to take Greenland) gets absolute power. Fuck that shit, I give it 12 months once Trump crosses the rubicon before hen uses his sharpie to move the border.
Move to europe, same exact shit but with putin.
Only place to escape is maybe Australia.
If only it were that easy. Many of us have family we help take care of (and who wouldn’t move because they are to old). And children who would suffer greatly by such a drastic move (mine has special needs, so moving means new doctors and schools…). Then there is the issue of a job.
Those in power have done a great job making it hard for people to just up and move.
I am in the same boat. I’m ready to up and leave for almost anywhere else …but I can’t leave my family here. And they don’t want to move or can’t move
Oh come on! Canada IS my escape plan! I just finished step 1 and bought a house 20 miles from the border in Maine!
Escape to Canada only works if Trump is prevented from consolidating power and you just want to get away from the people who elected him.
Still a big upgrade from the US, just saying that it might only be temporary.
Folks, NEVER call police on anyone. It’s a death sentence.
To be fair, no all of us live in a shithole.
I just wish there was an alternative. I want to be able to call a welfare check on my neighbors if they are getting physical but the likelyhood that it gets worse instead of better after the cops arive is so high I would never do it.
“The State would be unable to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that the four officers who discharged their weapons were not justified in using deadly force,”
Shouldn’t that be up to a jury to decide?
Murder. No question. They had several ways to deescalate and preserve the lives of everyone and they maximized the probability of someone getting shot by rushing in, not assessing the situation, getting within feet of the suspect, not applying any non-lethal force, and not backing away when the suspect would’ve been stopped by a chainlink fence.
yeah but have you considered that they wanted to feel powerful?
it’s a crime to deny a cop their right to exercise that
A TV show where vampires are real, so the cops are all scared, but the public doesn’t know. The cops keep shooting people dead thinking they’re vampires (so to the viewer the force seems justified).
During the final few episodes, it becomes more obvious that the vampires were never real. They were just gossip.
One season long.
Show title: Harvest Season.
Sounds like American Horror Story material right there.
I think i know a dude in Nashville and another in Napa who’d be down so that’s four of us
Between RFK Jr’s people fueling anti-Autism hysterics and police afforded virtually unlimited latitude to killed the physically and mentally impaired, America is outright embracing eugenics of anyone the state leadership considers unprofitable.
Removed by mod
ACANazis
