Finally ...

A Texas jury … again, a Texas jury … has convicted former Dallas police officer Amber Guyger of murder in the fatal 2018 shooting of Botham Jean, an innocent man, eating ice cream in his own home after mistaking his apartment for her own.

Guyger was fired from the Dallas Police Department shortly after the shooting now faces a prison sentence of five to 99 years.

Finally.

Finally, a police officer who shoots an unarmed black man is being punished for the crime. Finally. I don’t have any ill will toward Guyger, but let’s remember what she did, and did not do …

Amber Guyger  told the jury that on the night of the shooting she was tired from a long day at work and mistakenly parked her car on the wrong floor. She then went to what she thought was her apartment door and said she heard someone walking around inside.

She put her key into the lock and noticed that the door was "cracked open" and that putting the key into the lock forced the door open to the dark apartment. She claimed she’d had troubles getting her door to lock completely, so she entered.

Botham Jean was sitting on his couch in his apartment when Guyger opened his front door and shot him without giving him a chance to surrender. She says she saw the silhouette of a figure, so she pulled her "gun out and I yelled at him." She said the figure was moving around and she could not see his hands, and that the man "was yelling, 'Hey! Hey! Hey!' in an aggressive voice” and was moving toward her.

"I was scared he was gonna kill me."

In his apartment, eating ice cream on the couch.

Guyger's defense team attempted to use the Castle Doctrine, which is similar to Florida's "stand your ground" law, as a defense, arguing that while she was in the wrong apartment, in her mind she believed she was in her own unit, which was a floor below Jean's.

Seriously. She made the mistake; she entered the wrong apartment; she fired a gun; she murdered a man, and the defense is what?

“Oops?”

In his closing arguments Dallas County Assistant District Attorney Jason Fine asked jurors to reject Guyer's "crazy" contention that she shot Botham Jean in self-defense because she believed she was in her own apartment and that the victim, who was sitting on his couch eating ice cream, was going to kill her and read an excerpt from Guyger's testimony:

"I never want anybody to have to go through or even imagine going through what I felt that night."

Fine was livid:

“Are you kidding me? That is garbage. Most of what she said was garbage. Ninety-nine percent of this trial has been about the defendant [and not Botham Jean]. He's eating ice cream on his couch. So, if you're sitting and eating ice cream you get shot in the heart? Is that what we're saying?"

Not yesterday; yesterday a jury said that Black Lives Matter.

Finally. Justice for Botham Jean.

Amber Guyger Indicted For The Murder Of Botham Jean

With an option to indict her for manslaughter, or murder, or nothing at all, last week, a Texas grand jury indicted Amber Guyger for murder in the shooting death of Botham Jean in his apartment this past September.

Guyger, who was a Dallas police officer at the time of the shooting, was arrested and charged with manslaughter three days after she shot and killed the unarmed Botham Jean in his apartment; she was eventually—and don’t get me started on eventually—fired from her job.

Here’s what the Grand Jury learned … Amber Guyger, on the night of the murder, had just ended a 15-hour shift when she returned home, in uniform, to her apartment building; she parked on the fourth floor, instead of the third, where she lived, which suggests she was confused or disoriented … or something.

Guyger went to an apartment, put her key in the door, found it unlocked, slightly ajar, and entered the apartment. Inside, the lights were off, and she saw a figure in the darkness. In her statement, she said she her apartment was being burglarized and gave verbal commands to the figure, who ignored them, and then she drew her weapon and fired twice.

She called 911 and when asked where she was, she didn’t say she was at home, she went to the front door to find that she was in the wrong apartment.

However, two independent witnesses have said they heard knocking on Jean’s door before the shooting, and one witness reported hearing a woman shouting, “Let me in! Let me in!” before hearing gunshots. The witness says he then heard a man saying:

“Oh my God! Why did you do that?”

Those may have been Botham Jean’s last words and hopefully, if amber Guyger decides to be truthful, we might actually learn why she did it.

When asked why the grand jury indicted Guyger on the more serious offense of murder, Dallas County District Attorney Faith Johnson said, "We presented the evidence and we explained the law."

And the law states that murder constitutes someone "intentionally and knowingly" committing a crime, whereas manslaughter involves "recklessly doing something." Johnson believes that, at “the moment of the shooting it was a knowing ... offense."

Meaning Amber Guyger knew what she was doing when she fired her gun that night, and the only person who didn’t know anything was Botham Jean.

I hope his family, after the trial, will know justice.

The Grio

CNN

Botham Jean's Murder, Beto O'Rourke and Ted Cruz

Down in Texas, Congressman Beto O’Rourke is running for Senate against Ted Cruz.

O’Rourke has said he supports firing Dallas police officer Amber Guyger after she entered the wrong apartment and killed Botham Jean, an innocent man. He agrees with calls by Jean’s family, and many others in Dallas, that should be fired:

“There has to be a full accounting for how young black men continue to be killed in this country without accountability, without justice, without these full investigations, without respecting their civil rights. This cannot continue.”

Ted Cruz had a different response; he says people are rushing to judgment on the case and that O’Rourke and Democrats were “quick to always blame the police officer”:

“It may well be that two lives were destroyed that night. That obviously the individual that was at home in his apartment and found himself murdered — that is horrific and a nightmare.”

Yes, he said that Botham Jean—and he cannot even say the man’s name—“found himself murdered.” And then he claims that Amber Guyger’s life was also destroyed that night except that Guyger is still alive; the only thing she ruined is her career, except Cruz doesn’t think she should be fired for entering an apartment she thought was hers and then murdering the occupant of that apartment and then taking three days to get her story straight.

Let’s make this perfectly queer for Ted … according to Guyger’s own account, she came home on September 6 after a long shift and didn’t know that she’s gotten off on the wrong floor of her building and that the apartment she entered was in was not hers and instantly began shooting at the “large silhouette” in the darkened room. When she turned on the lights in the apartment, she realized her mistake.

Mistake?

Botham Jean’s family disputes that account, saying Guyger should have noticed obvious signs that she was in the wrong apartment on the wrong floor; in addition, witnesses say they heard her knocking on Jean’s door and yelling.

But still, in America in 2018, Amber Guyger, after shooting an innocent man in his own home, is the victim in all of this for people like Ted Cruz, and Botham jean is simply the man who “found himself murdered.”

That’s it in a nutshell Texas; do you want a senator who sees this shooing as disturbing, as something that needs to stop, or do you want a senator who blames the real victim for being gunned down in his own home, and then calls the shooter a victim. Do you want another police officer going unpunished for a fatal shooting?

Vox