Dallas officer will face manslaughter charge
Neighbor shot after cop entered wrong place, chief says
DALLAS — A Dallas police officer who shot and killed her neighbor and later explained that she had mistaken his apartment for her own will be charged with manslaughter, the police chief said Friday.
It’s not clear what the officer may have said to 26-year-old Botham Jean between entering his home and shooting him Thursday, police Chief U. Renee
Hall said during a news conference.
But given what investigators know about the case, they decided to pursue a manslaughter charge, she said.
“Right now there are more questions than we have answers,” Hall said, adding that she spoke to Jean’s sister to express the department’s condolences to the family.
According to police, the officer, whose name hasn’t been released, returned home in her uniform after her shift.
She called dispatch to report that she had shot a man, and she later told the officers who responded to the call that she believed the victim’s apartment was her own when she entered it.
The responding officers administered first aid to Jean, a native of the Caribbean island country of St. Lucia who attended college in Arkansas and worked for accounting and consulting firm PwC.
Jean was taken to a hospital, where he died.
Hall said the officer’s blood was drawn to be tested for drugs and alcohol.
She declined to speculate as to whether fatigue or other factors, including race, may have factored into the shooting; the officer is white, Jean is black.
Authorities haven’t said how the officer got into Jean’s home, or whether his door was open or unlocked.