Dallas police Officer Amber Guyger, who fatally shot 26-year-old Botham Jean in his Cedars apartment, was fired just days after Police Chief U. Renee Hall said doing so would compromise the criminal investigation. A news release stated that Hall fired Guyger after an internal investigation found the officer had engaged in “adverse conduct” when she was charged with manslaughter three days after the shooting.
Guyger shot Jean, her upstairs neighbor, the night of Sept. 6. Jean, an accountant with PricewaterhouseCoopers, lived on the fourth floor in apartment 1478 of the South Side Flats. Guyger, an officer for four years, was his immediate downstairs neighbor. After entering his apartment that she mistook for her own. She entered the dark apartment after a long shift and believed Jean, who was unarmed, was a burglar.
After she shot him, Guyger called 911 in tears, “I thought it was my apartment,” she said repeatedly and apologized to Jean, “I’m so sorry.” Police arrived within four minutes of her call, and paramedics rushed Jean to Baylor University Medical Center, where he was pronounced dead. Guyger was charged with manslaughter three days after the shooting and has been on administrative leave since the shooting. She’s currently free on a $300,000 bond while she awaits trial.
There was widespread calls for action and protests demanding that Guyger be terminated. Chief Hall said that she couldn’t fire Guyger before an internal investigation was completed because of federal, state and local laws but she didn’t specify to which laws she was referring. Hall released a statement saying she didn’t want to risk interfering with a criminal investigation by making a decision about Guyger’s employment.
The Dallas Police Department turned over the investigation to the Texas Rangers shortly after the shooting. The Dallas County District Attorney’s office is also conducting its own investigation. Those investigations aren’t complete, but Hall said police were notified that a “critical portion” of the criminal investigation — the part that could have been compromised by an internal investigation — had been concluded over the weekend.
Guyger’s firing was supported by Mayor Mike Rawlings, who called it “the right decision in the interest of justice”. A statement from the mayor read “I have heard the calls for this action from many, including the Jean family, and I agree that this is the right decision in the interest of justice for Botham Jean and the citizens of Dallas. The swift termination of any officer who engages in misconduct that leads to the loss of innocent life is essential if the Dallas Police Department is to gain and maintain the public trust.”
Guyger’s attorney Robert Rogers said in a written statement that Hall “bowed to pressure from anti-police groups and took action before all of the facts had been gathered and due process was afforded.” Rogers said his client is “completely devastated by what happened.” The shooting, he said, was “a tragic mistake and words can never express our sorrow for the pain being suffered by those who knew and loved Botham Jean.”
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Many are outraged after a Dallas police officer has only been charged with manslaughter after shooting and killing 26-year-old Botham Shem Jean in his own apartment. Police Officer Amber Guyger, who was off-duty at the time of the shooting, says she thought she was in her own apartment and fired after thinking she was confronting an intruder in the dark apartment. She turned herself in and was released on $300,000 bond. Investigators have taken a blood sample from the officer to test for drugs and alcohol but the results have not been released.
As more details of what happened that night are released, the incident seems more and more confusing, adding to the mystery of the case. According to Guyger’s account, she arrived home around 10pm after working a 15-hour shift to the South Side Flats apartments on September 6th. She didn’t realize she had parked her car on the wrong level of the parking garage and entered the wrong floor of her building. Guyger lives on the fourth floor while Jean lived on the third floor. Once she entered what she thought was her own apartment, she says she saw a “large silhouette” in the dark apartment and she thought she had walked in on a burglary. She fired, hitting Jean in the chest, ultimately killing him and only realized that the apartment was not hers when she turned on the lights in the apartment. She then called 911 and checked the apartment number outside the door as she explained what occurred to the dispatcher.
Details of a September 9 arrest affidavit filed after Guyger turned herself in only add to the confusion. The affidavit, which was written after an interview with Guyger, states that Jean was actually shot farther into his apartment. In that account, after Guyger returned home and entered the wrong floor of the building, she attempted to use an electronic key to open the apartment front door. However, the door was slightly ajar and the force of using her key pushed the door open, despite the fact that her key did not open the lock. Guyger then entered the apartment and after seeing a “large silhouette” issued verbal commands and then fired twice.
Attorney Lee Merritt, who is representing the family, said they are skeptical that Jean would have left the door to his apartment ajar, saying the PricewaterhouseCoopers worker was a “meticulous” person who would have made sure his door was locked for his own safety. Merritt also said that two sisters who live in the building had come forward giving details that contradict the affidavit. The sisters claim that before the shooting, they heard knocking followed by a woman’s voice saying, “Let me in. Let me in.” Then they heard gunshots, followed by a man’s voice saying, “Oh my God, why did you do that?” One of the women also took a video after the shooting, which shows what appears to be Guyger pacing outside the apartment as emergency responders arrive.
The case is still under investigation by the Texas Rangers and separately by the district attorney’s office– and will be presented to a grand jury. A grand jury will decide whether to indict Guyger on a different charge than manslaughter or not to indict her at all. Jean’s family and community members have raised a number of concerns about the pace of the investigation and how it is being handled. They argue that Guyger is receiving deferential treatment that a civilian suspect would not receive, noting that she was charged with manslaughter rather than murder and that the charge did not come until three days after the shooting.
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