Acquitted ex-officer living in Houston
Verdict in St. Louis murder case sparked protests
The former St. Louis police officer whose acquittal last week in the 2011 fatal shooting of a black motorist spawned days of protests, has been living in Houston for several years.
Jason Stockley, who is white, was charged with first-degree murder in the killing of Anthony Lamar Smith, 24, following a car chase in Missouri.
Stockley was arrested in May 2016 in Harris County and extradited to Missouri to face the charges, according to local court records.
During the nonjury trial in Missouri, which started in August, prosecutors accused Stockley of planting a revolver on the motorist after the shooting, saying a gun found inside the car had the officer’s DNA and not Smith’s.
Stockley, who has maintained that the shooting was self-defense, testified that he saw a gun in Smith’s hand when he initially approached the Buick before the chase.
Judge Timothy Wilson rendered verdicts Friday morning of not guilty for the murder charge and one count of armed criminal action.
Protesters assembled almost immediately and marched, mostly peacefully, all day. By Friday night, agitation grew. The mayor’s home was vandalized by a rock thrown through a window and splattered paint. Police in riot gear showed up and started discharging tear gas. Orderly
daytime demonstrations and volatile evening riots continued through the weekend, leading to concert cancellations, commerce interruptions and early school dismissals.
After a gag order was lifted following the verdict, Stockley told the St. Louis Post-Dispatch that taking a life is “not something that is done lightly” and denied murdering Smith.
Stockley’s lawyer, Neil J. Bruntrager with the St. Louis Police Officers Association, could not be reached Monday for comment.
National outcry
The shooting happened before widespread national outcry about the killings of unarmed black people, including Trayvon Martin, the Florida 17-year-old fatally shot in 2012 by a neighborhood watch officer and Michael Brown, 18, who died when he was fired upon in 2014 by an officer in Ferguson, Mo. — a St. Louis suburb. The acquittal of Martin’s killer, George Zimmerman, sparked the Black Lives Matter movement.
Stockley and his partner, Brian Bianchi, approached Smith’s Buick after witnessing what they believed was a drug transaction, according to a police department memo obtained by the Post-Dispatch.
Bianchi told Stockley that Smith was reaching for a weapon, the report said.
Stockley left the police SUV and approached Smith’s vehicle with his department handgun and a personal AK-47 pistol, according to the memo.
Smith fled. His sedan hit Stockley, who fired several shots at the vehicle. The officers pursued Smith until the police vehicle hit the Buick.
Smith, a father, was shot five times.
The report said that Stockley fired the weapon because he feared for his life and the safety of others. Stockley violated policy by carrying the privately owned gun.
Since coming to the Houston area four years ago, Stockley has worked and divorced. According to his LinkedIn profile, he is a project manager and security specialist currently seeking employment.
He has not worked in law enforcement in Texas, according to Gretchen Grigsby, a spokeswoman with the Texas Commission on Law Enforcement. She said Monday that there is no past or present licensing record for him.
Stockley, now 36, left the St. Louis police department in 2013. That year, the St. Louis police board settled a federal wrongful death lawsuit filed by Smith’s survivors for $900,000.
Iraq war veteran
The former officer’s LinkedIn profile says that he received an engineering degree from the U.S. Military Academy at West Point in 2002. He is an Iraq war veteran who served in combat as an infantry platoon leader, the online résumé says, before spending 2004 to 2006 as a U.S. Army captain.
His tenure with the St. Louis Metropolitan Police Department lasted from 2006 to 2013, the profile said. His experience in Houston includes 2½ years as a project manager with an oil and gas drilling consulting firm.
In a civil lawsuit filed in Harris County, Stockley claimed to have sustained “personal bodily injuries” in a 2015 wreck when a Jeep Wrangler allegedly ran a red light and smashed into the rear of his Toyota Corolla. The case was dismissed for lack of prosecution.