Mostly White Jury Lets White Detroit Cop Walk in Fatal Shooting of Unarmed 7 yr old Black Girl
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From [HERE] and [HERE] A mistrial has been declared after a mostly white jury said they won't continue deliberating in the trial for a white Detroit officer charged in the 2010 shooting death of a 7-year-old Black girl. The jury sent a note Tuesday to Judge Cynthia Gray Hathaway saying no significant progress had been made toward a verdict in their three days of deliberations. Nearly two hours later, that was followed by another note that said the jury was unable to reach a verdict.
The jury was composed of 11 whites and one African-American. The "Justice for Aiyana Jones Committee" stated “from the start, we (JAJC) had no confidence in this jury that had only one African-American juror from a county that is over 42 percent African-American.
White police officer Joseph Weekley (in photo) was charged with felony involuntary manslaughter and careless discharge of a firearm causing death in the shooting of 7-year-old Aiyana Stanley-Jones, who was Black. He killed the child during a 2010 raid that was being filmed for a reality cable TV show.
Also indicted in 2011 was Allison Howard (in photo), an A&E producer for "The First 48" TV crew following police during the raid. She was indicted on charges of perjury during an investigative subpoena and obstruction of justice. She is also white. She pled guilty yesterday. Howard will serve 1 1/2 to 2 years' probation in Massachusetts. [MORE]
The night Aiyana Jones died, Detroit police were searching for murder suspect, Chauncey Owens, who was engaged to Aiyana's aunt, in connection with the May 14, 2010, murder of 18-year-old Jerean Blake. After obtaining a search warrant, police kicked in the front door of the home on Lillibridge, where Owens was thought to be hiding.
They threw a flashbang grenade into the downstairs flat of a multi-family home on Lillibridge about 12:40 a.m. and Weekley was accused of firing the bullet that struck and killed the girl, who was sleeping on the couch in the front room of the home. The "flash-bang" light-emitting grenade was meant to distract suspects.
Aiyana's family, represented by Geoffrey Feiger in a pending civil case, claims police attempted to cover up the fatal mistake from the very beginning.
Police arrested Aiyana's grandmother and initially said the gun fired when Weekley engaged in a physical altercation with the woman inside the apartment.
"I said, 'You F'ed up. Gone and killed my grandbaby,' " Mertilla Jones, Aiyana's grandmother told the Detroit News days after the shooting. "One of them yelled, 'Oh s---!' They took her up in their arms and ran out the house with her." The entire incident, according to Feiger, who said he witnessed the footage possessed by an unnamed source, was captured on film by A&E's "48 Hours," a series that follows homicide investigators during the first two days after a homicide. Feiger has since filed a civil lawsuit in Aiyana's death.
