Baltimore jury mulls officer’s fate in Freddie Gray’s death

Michael Schatzow, center, chief deputy State’s Attorney for Baltimore City, walks to a courthouse for closing arguments in the trial of William Porter, one of six city police officers charged in connection to the death of F…

With a verdict possible this week, the city of Baltimore – which witnessed protests and unrest after Gray’s death – said it activated its emergency operations center Monday “out of an abundance of caution”.

The prosecution and defense delivered their closing arguments Monday after eight days of testimony.

A court spokeswoman said the judge denied the request, since no transcripts were introduced as evidence, The Associated Press reported. She says Porter “just didn’t care enough”.

The jurors later sought clarification of “evil motive” and other terms, but the judge said could not expand on his instructions.

While not one of the three officers who initially arrested Gray, Porter was in the police van for the 45-minute ride which made several stops before arriving at the station.

If convicted, the officer faces a maximum sentence of 10 years or a minimum of probation. Goering said Thornton’s letter “assumes students would engage in violent acts, assumes that students only want to express their emotions, not rational views about the conduct of police and lack of accountability, and it misses an opportunity to affirmatively engage students who want to be politically engaged on these issues”.

“Whatever the verdict, we need everyone in our city to respect the judicial process”, Mayor Stephanie Rawlings-Blake said.

Porter is the first of six officers to go on trial in Gray’s death.

Murtha called Gray’s death a “horrific tragedy” but said that “there is literally no evidence” that Porter’s actions in any way caused it. Murtha said expert witnesses disagreed on the timeline of when Gray suffered the injury that eventually killed him, and that constitutes “reasonable doubt”.

At the start of jury selection two weeks ago, Judge Barry Williams told potential jurors he would expect the case to be completed by Thursday.

Bledsoe showed jurors the unfastened seat belt from the transport wagon.

Porter’s attorney, Joseph Murtha, said in his closing argument that nothing more than conjecture and speculation implicates his client.

The charges against the other officers range from second-degree murder to misconduct. He asserted that prosecutors offered no hard evidence that Gray was seriously hurt during two key interactions with Porter.

Prosecutors said Porter is partly responsible because he ignored a departmental policy requiring officers to buckle prisoners in seat belts, and didn’t call for an ambulance when Gray indicated he needed medical aid.

Hogan spoke on WBAL’s C4 show on Tuesday as jurors began their second day of deliberations in the trial of Officer William Porter, the first of six officers being tried in connection with Gray’s death.

Prosecutors say Porter abused his power by failing to save Gray’s life after the man was injured in the back of a police van.

Jurors will have to determine who they believe most: the prosecutors who say Porter is an indifferent cop and criminally responsible for Gray’s fatal spinal injury, or the defense attorneys’ characterization that he is a falsely accused police officer who asked after Gray and told his supervisors to bring the man to the hospital.

The van stopped three more times as officers checked on Gray, and at one point, Porter opened the van’s doors and lifted Gray to a seated position, although still unbuckled.

Porter conceded that Gray asked for medical help during stop four, but said he did not call a medic because Gray didn’t appear to be injured and didn’t articulate what was wrong.

The van detoured again to put another prisoner in a separate section before Gray finally arrived at the station in a critical condition.