NYPD Phases Out Programs that Pair Rookie Officers to Fight Crime

The family of Akai Gurley react to NYPD officer Peter Liang being found guilty of manslaughter in the 2014 stairwell shooting in a Brooklyn public housing complex.

Liang’s charges came after he shot Gurley, 28, in a darkened stairwell while patrolling a Brooklyn housing project.

Liang was also convicted of official misconduct for failing to offer medical aid to the dying Gurley.

Liang faces up to 15 years in prison for the second-degree manslaughter charge (any sentencing for the misconduct charge would be served concurrently). At closing arguments, Liang’s lawyers asked the judge to declare a mistrial, saying the prosecution made an “inflammatory and inappropriate” argument when they said Liang intentionally shot Gurley. But the defense said the shooting was an accident, not a crime.

The guilty verdict sends a powerful message to law enforcement after several cases of police shootings of unarmed men in the past year went unprosecuted. Liang then radioed for an ambulance, but he acknowledged not helping Gurley’s girlfriend try to revive him.

Liang and his partner, Shaun Landau, who was given immunity, were conducting a vertical patrol of a stairwell on November 20, 2014, in the Louis H. Pink Houses when Liang fired his gun.

The defendant said he had been holding his gun safely, with his finger positioned on the side and not on the trigger, when a sound surprised him and opened fire into the stairwell. The mostly white jury deliberated for more than two days.

But Patrick Lynch, the president of the city’s largest police union, said in a statement that the verdict “will have a chilling effect on police officers across the city because it criminalizes a tragic accident”.

“Though Liang has been found guilty, we want to make sure that his sentencing is heavy and that there is no appeal”, they said.

Prosecutors said Liang was reckless and did little to help Gurley.

Some say, however, that the conviction will hamper the ability of police officers to do their work.

“I think it’s tragic all the way around and I just think that what we need to do is provide better training”, she said.

Liang’s willingness to walk around a public-housing building with a drawn weapon raised the issue of reasonable force–something that has played out across the nation and has gained increasing attention amid the shootings by police of unarmed black men and women. Others, including members of CAAAV Organizing Asian Communities, a group that addresses police and hate violence toward Asian immigrants, have maintained that the indictment was just and that Liang must be held accountable.

Liang’s behavior after the shooting has also had an impact on the case. He said he did not realize anyone had been hit until he went down the stairs to look for the bullet.

“I was panicking. I was in shock, in disbelief that someone was actually hit”, Liang said at trial.