Prosecutor critical of police in teen’s death: No plan
State rests its case against trooper accused of killing 19-year-old
The state rested its case Thursday against state police Trooper Brian North in the fatal shooting of 19-year-old Mubarak Soulemane after testimony from additional state police at the scene, experts in forensics and the medical examiner who conducted the teen’s autopsy.
Thursday marked the fourth day of the trial at Ansonia-milford Judicial District Courthouse, where North faces one count of first-degree manslaughter with a firearm after an investigation by state Inspector General Robert Devlin Jr. concluded North was not justified when he fired seven shots at Soulemane following a police pursuit that began in the Bridgeport area and ended in West Haven on Jan. 15, 2020. Despite reaching for a knife and raising his arm, Devlin has argued that Soulemane was not a threat to police around the vehicle he was in, which was locked and had its windows up before an officer smashed out a passenger side window.
The most contentious moments of the trial thus far have come as troopers and officers from the scene took the stand. Devlin has been critical of their response once Soulemane left Interstate 95 at Exit 43 and crashed a stolen Hyundai Sonata into a Chevrolet Trailblazer, allowing law enforcement to partially box him in. Devlin — a former prosecutor and judge — has painted the decision to approach the Sonata on foot and breach the vehicle as reckless and unnecessary.
Earlier in the week, the jury heard from family members of Soulemane and his girlfriend, who testified that he appeared to be undergoing a psychiatric episode in the days leading up to the shooting.
His family testified that Soulemane had his first episode at the age of 14, when he was diagnosed with schizophrenia and bipolar disorder, and was in and out of the hospital regularly for adjustments to his medication, which he frequently struggled to take.
The day of the shooting, Soulemane’s behavior at an AT&T store in Norwalk was odd and he displayed a knife before stealing a Sonata from the Lyft rideshare driver he requested, according to testimony. Norwalk police initially pursued the teen and called off their pursuit before Connecticut State Police were incorrectly told the Sonata driver was involved in a carjacking. State police then pursued Soulemane, who at times drove over 90 mph and crashed into multiple motorists including police cruisers, before the collision off of Exit 43 at 5:04 p.m.
State police Trooper Ross Dalling took the stand Thursday and told the jury police did not have a predetermined plan as he, North, Trooper Joshua Jackson and West Haven Police Officer Anthony Rappa exited their cruisers and approached the Sonata on foot.
“A plan? No, the plan was to stop the threat,” Dalling testified.
Devlin pressed Dalling on whether state police policies would allow for the use of deadly force given the circumstances police encountered when they approached the Sonata, which included Soulemane unresponsive in the vehicle with the doors locked and windows up, and why they did not wait for supervisors as backup.
Dalling said deadly force would not have been justified at that precise moment and that waiting for a superior was “just not realistic.”
When asked if troopers communicated at all, Dalling said North told Jackson to use his taser as Rappa broke the passenger side window of the Sonata with a baton.
When pressed by Devlin as to whether police communicated with one another beyond the request to use a taser, Dalling said “No, we just relied on our training and that’s what happened.”
“That’s what happened and you’re pulling a dead boy out of a car,” Devlin fired back.
During his cross-examination of Dalling, North’s attorney, Frank Riccio, focused on key points he has highlighted throughout the trial, including that state police were investigating what they believed at the time to be a carjacking involving a suspect armed with a knife and that the events that led to the shooting unfolded in less than a minute from the time police approached the Sonata. Throughout the trial, Riccio has also driven home his assertion that Soulemane was a threat based on his reckless driving during the pursuit with state troopers, which he said endangered hundreds of other motorists.
Dalling also testified to Riccio’s assertions that police did not have time to use de-escalation techniques and that Rappa took it upon himself to break the window.
“You had to adapt to that situation,” said Riccio, who has maintained throughout the trial that the broken window gave a suspect armed with a knife an unobstructed path to potentially harm Jackson and Rappa.
Devlin insisted during Dalling’s testimony that police were in control of the timing in which the events unfolded, to which Dalling disagreed.
“It didn’t have to happen that way,” Devlin said.
“Again, not listening to commands,” Dalling said of police attempting to breach the vehicle.
State police Sgt. Thomas Kiely, a supervisor working the night of the shooting, also took the stand Thursday and testified that he monitored the pursuit — without calling it off — by listening to radio transmissions in the Troop G dispatch center and watching state Department of Transportation highway cameras. He went to the scene after learning that shots were fired and asked North for a brief synopsis of what had happened.
Over an objection from Riccio on the grounds that it was hearsay, Devlin submitted a portion of the report Kiely would later file, which included North’s synopsis on scene of what happened. It read, in part, that North was using felony stop procedures and that Soulemane was “out of it” until Rappa broke the window, at which point the teen “came to.”
“Trooper North stated that the suspect then reached into his waistband and pulled out a knife,” Kiely wrote. “Trooper North stated that he subsequently fired his duty weapon.”
Riccio pointed out that North was only asked for a synopsis of what happened and that what he said at the scene, minutes after “very tense moments,” was not a “soup to nuts” version of what happened.
Douglas Lacey, who formerly worked for the FBI’S forensic audio and video unit, took the stand to testify about portions of body cam footage from North and Jackson that he was asked by the Office of Inspector General to enhance. Lacey, who left the FBI in 2003 to work in the private sector in media forensics, was asked specifically to enhance the level of detail inside the Sonata through the trooper’s cameras.
The jury viewed enhanced versions from each trooper’s body cam that showed the moments leading up to when North fired. Each clip was between 10 to 11 seconds in length. The six-person jury also saw versions of the video that were slowed to a quarter-speed as well as numerous still frames that were milliseconds apart, showing the moments leading up to when the first shot was fired.
During cross-examination, Riccio pointed out to Lacey that the troopers on scene did not have the benefit of detail enhancements provided by a computer.
“No, that’s correct,” Lacey said. “They did not.”
“They would have been observing it with their naked eye,” Lacey said, clarifying that a human eye would be more sensitive to light than a camera lens.
Lisa Ragaza, who works for the state Division of Scientific Services, testified Thursday that her microscopic analysis of the cartridges and bullets seized following the shooting confirmed that they were fired from North’s Smith & Wesson M&P pistol.
Dr. Jacqueline Nunez, an associate medical examiner with the Connecticut Office of the Chief Medical Examiner, took the stand to testify about the results of the autopsy she conducted on Soulemane a day after he was killed. Nunez said the autopsy revealed he died of gunshot wounds to his torso and extremities.
Nunez testified that she identified nine gunshot wounds and that three bullet fragments were removed from Soulemane’s body. A toxicology report showed the teenager had THC — the psychoactive compound in marijuana — in his system, Nunez testified.
Riccio chose not to cross-examine Nunez.
After a brief recess following her testimony, Devlin said the state rested its case.
Riccio’s defense is expected to begin at 10 a.m. Friday. He was noncommittal earlier in the week when asked by Judge H. Gordon Hall whether North would take the stand.