Photos courtesy of Mesquite County Police and HARDING UNIVERSITY/KCSO/AP
“We the jury, unanimously find the defendant, Amber Guyger, guilty.” These were the words of Judge Tammy Kemp as she read the verdict of Amber Guyger on Tuesday afternoon. On Wednesday this same jury decided to sentence Guyger to 10 years in prison. In the state of Texas, a murder charge carries an imprisonment time of 5 to 99 years, or life.
Guyger, a white female and former Dallas police officer, was on trial for the murder of Botham Jean, a black man and accountant.
Gasps, claps, cheers, and tears can be heard from the gallery and those waiting outside the courtroom when the verdict was read and Members of the slain 26-year-old’s family can be seen wiping tears and embracing one another.
Outside the courtroom attornies Benjamin Krump, Lee Merrit, and Daryl Washington, who are representing the victim’s family, held a press conference, expressing their pleasure with the trial’s outcome.
This verdict comes after an emotional 8-day-long trial, where dozens of witnesses and experts took the stand to give their accounts and thoughts on the year-old case.
On the night of September 6, 2018, Jean was sitting with a bowl of ice cream in his 4th-floor apartment located on the southside of Dallas, when the off-duty officer allegedly mistook his apartment for her own, walked in, mistook him for an intruder, and ultimately shot at killed him.
This news comes a few months after a New York jury decided that the officer responsible for the death of Eric Garner would not be charged.
Botham would have turned 28 years old on Sunday, September 29.
TELL US: Fair or Foul? What do you think of this verdict and sentence?
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