Former officer charged in rape
In Ala., after being cleared in teen’s death
A former Memphis police officer who was forced to resign after shooting and killing a teenager in 2012 has been charged with rape in Huntsville, Ala., where he is a student.
According to Alabama A& M University officials, Terrance Antwan Shaw, 2 9, was charged with firstdegree rape a nd first- degree sodomy in a case investigators said involved Shaw’s former girlfriend. University police arrested Shaw on Sunday.
He was released from Madison County Jail on Monday after posting $20,000 bond and is scheduled to appear in Madison County District Court in Huntsville on Dec. 4.
The initial offense report said, “Officers received a phone call from a third party stating that her friend had been raped and 3 adult males had witnessed the act. The victim was taken to a Crisis Center ... .”
Wendy Kobler, AAMU information officer, said
Shaw had enrolled as a graduate student this semester.
Shaw was cleared in the September 2012 shooting death of 15-year-old Justin Thompson.
The ex- officer said he had been trying to help the teen, and that Thompson claimed he was 18, and had no money for food. Shaw told police investigators he shot Thompson with his service weapon at their final meeting after Thompson pulled a revolver and demanded money from him.
A lawsuit against Shaw by the victim’s mother, however, contends the teenager was unarmed.
After agents from the Tennessee Bureau of Investigation conducted a probe into the shooting, Shelby County Dist. Atty. Gen. Amy Weirich elected not to charge Shaw. In a statement, Weirich said: “There is insufficient evidence to create a reasonable chance for a conviction against Mr. Shaw, particularly when considered with the foreseeable defense that could be raised under the evidence.”
In April, Shaw resigned rather than be terminated from the Memphis Police Department after an administrative hearing. “We felt that there was some conduct on his part that did not necessarily meet with our expectations,” MPD Director Toney Armstrong said.
Responding to questions about allegations by Thompson’s mother that her son and the officer were planning to meet the night of the boy’s death, Armstrong said it was not appropriate for an officer “to have an interaction with a child without the parent’s consent.”
It was the second time Shaw shot and killed someone during his six years on the force. In February 2009, Shaw fatally shot a 25-year-old man in a car he and his partner were investigating in the Raleigh area. Internal police records also showed that he shot dogs in 2008 and 2011.
MPD’s internal affairs files on the shooting of Thompson showed that police officials questioned Shaw’s interactions with the teen. During the month he knew Thompson, Shaw never revealed that he was a police officer and never told Thompson’s mother that he had a relationship with her son.
After he shot Thompson, Shaw called 911 twice to report the shooting, but failed to identify himself by name or as a police officer.
In September, t he youth’s mother, Shirley Thompson, filed a federal lawsuit against Shaw and the MPD, seeking $10 million and alleging Shaw violated her son’s civil rights by using excessive force.
The suit, which was originally sealed, alleges that police officials should have known that “Officer Shaw was ‘trigger-happy,’ and keeping him on the streets ... posed a serious danger to the community resulting in the death of an unarmed minor, J.T.”