“Activist” is intended to be a value neutral description of someone with a social agenda beyond just this specific case. In some contexts, I suppose it might mean a pro-police agenda, but obviously not in the context of an attorney representing the victim here.
Do you think it’s an inappropriate term, or is there some other subtext to your passive aggressive “question”? If so, you’ll have to spell it out, because I don’t know what views you are imputing to me.
What I don’t get is the arrest affidavit says that she lives in apartment 1478 and that she parked on the fourth floor of the parking garage and then walked down the fourth floor hallway to his apartment, 1378. Wouldn’t apartment 1378 be on the third floor of the building and adjacent to the third floor of the parking garage?
The idea that the LE officer had a beef with the victim is possible (but I doubt it). If you want to explore this, though - IMHO there are two possible scenarios:
Was this a case of the LE officer & the victim having been romantically involved at one time, had a bad breakup, and that this was a “revenge” killing?! Sure, it’s possible. They lived close to each other. But, something like this can be easily researched & proven (i.e., if they were in a relationship) and she would have to be incredibly stupid to have killed him over something like that & then tried to “cover it up” with the “wrong apartment” excuse. Not saying that this definitively didn’t happen, but I find it to be an extremely unlikely scenario. I know that very early in this case a news article claimed there was a connection between the two of them, but this was later proven to be erroneous.
Was she upset over the noise coming from his apartment (since it was adjacent to hers) and decided to get her revenge with this “wrong apartment” scenario?! Again possible, but I don’t find this too likely either. B. Jean was a youth leader & professionally employed. I somehow doubt he was having wild parties all night that would cause a lot of noise, and/or playing loud music all night. But, it’s possible. However, as in the scenario #1 above, if the LE officer made official complaints against him - or even if they were known to have arguments about noise, etc. - that could be easily proven as well. And, there is no indication anything like this happened.
never mind, found the story
I understand walking into the wrong apartment. What I don’t understand is a police officer firing her weapon at a vague figure in a dark apartment. In a dark apartment, she couldn’t have known how many people were in there or where they were. In a dark apartment, she couldn’t possibly tell if her orders were being followed. Shooting into a dark apartment isn’t just a violation of basic police procedure; it’s not even sensible civilian procedure.
Even in the most generous interpretation of her actions, someone who ignores all her training when in a crisis is not someone I’d want on the force. If there’s exculpatory evidence, I can’t imagine what it might be.
This piece issues some serious criticism of the journalism involving this case:
Dallas Media Have Blindly Accepted What the Cops Tell Them About Botham Jean Killing
An excerpt (bolding mine):
The search warrant contains the detail about an “exchange of words” between the officer and the victim, which according to witnesses took place at the door. But none of this occurred according to the arrest affidavit, since it reports the only words that were expressed were the officer’s (mysteriously vague) verbal commands. Commands conveniently issued inside the apartment. Seems to me that both of these accounts should be given equal weight in the reporting, and yet only one is being treated as the official record. I agree with the writer that this is some bullshit. But it does comfort me that it looks like some folks in the press are starting to realize what’s going on.
How did her key unlock his door?
Edit Oh, I see, that is unknown at this time.
So again let me say at the outset of this post: I am not discussing the actual event. We’re discussing a parallel universe in which she came home to HER apartment after 10 PM, encountered a man inside her apartment with the lights off, and who failed to respond to her commands.
Again referring you to Sec. 9.42(2), supra, deadly force may be used to protect property when the actor has reasonable belief that such force was immediately necessary to prevent the immediate commission of, inter alia, criminal mischief at night.
“At night,” is satisfied by the fact that the events in question happened at, or shortly after, 10 PM.
Criminal mischief is defined at Sec. 28.03(a), which definition includes in pertinent part tampering with the property of another in a way that causes substantial inconvenience to the owner. Finding a man in your darkened apartment at night triggers at the very least reasonable belief that your apartment and its contents are at risk of substantial inconvenience.
The law does not require her belief to be correct – merely that it be reasonable. And the law specifically removes from her any duty to retreat, so if you’re asking, “Why didn’t she just back into the hallway and await backup?” the answer is that the law forbids the fact-finder to consider that. There is no duty to retreat.
Now, when you say, “He did not enter with force,” just how much “force,” do you think is necessary to trigger this condition? Remember, again, we’re discussing the parallel universe, and remember, again, at issue is not what happened, but what her reasonable belief is.
They didn’t use keys, the apartment building uses key fobs.
Yes, it’s starting to look worse and worse. Maybe some elements in the local Dallas press were unduly sympathetic to the police, and the national press just picked up their versions? But surely this stuff will get so much scrutiny now that it’s going to be exposed. If there were unofficial statements by other cops that were made to journalists earlier, I really doubt that they will manage to suppress them. And somebody will get first hand accounts from the witnesses in the other apartments. I think the Dallas police are going to get crucified if they are exposed as covering up anything here.
Did you see the end of that article? Ironically, there’s link explaining a correction to that article, since in a prior version it had claimed Guyger’s brother in law was on Facebook making signs that the ADL database identifies as white supremacist. To their credit, they did manage to track the guy down, and discovered that he was actually signing “69” for somebody’s 69th birthday.
Initial accounts had the first responders administrating first aid. The Rangers’ completely, 100% unbiased report, created several days later had her initiating care. The video of her pacing back and forth while making the phone call is probably just fake news. Thank god we can trust the police to police their own.
Worst Surprise Birthday Party Ever. 
Perhaps Texas will end up in a vicious circle of more and more extreme forms of the castle doctrine. You now have a right to set up Aliens-style automatic sentries to wipe out anyone who comes within 50 meters of your apartment immediately, just in case the potential intruder is lost and mistakenly thinks they are about to enter their own apartment and will therefore believe they have a right to shoot you. We’ll basically all end up barricaded in our apartments shooting at each other.
Actually, I think the point about “police shootings” is that they are like this, and shouldn’t be.
This is how local news stories about police killings almost always work. Sometimes the story is just the police press release with a few words moved around. You can tell it comes from the police if it uses language like “officer-involved shooting” and exclusively uses the passive voice to refer to the killing. Bonus points if it includes a mugshot of the victim to pre-salt the jury pool with the belief that he was no angel.
Night time is especially wonderful time for gun wielders in places like Texas. (When does the magic immunity of night turn on? Is it affected by Daylight Savings Time?)
So it was a good kill. Move along, folks; nothing to see here.
I don’t know much weight to assign this, but apparently this video shows that doors at this complex are designed to shut completely unless held open.
Sure but you could easily put a piece of tape over the latching mechanism, put a small block at the floor etc. etc. It’s an interesting extra piece of information but it’s not the smoking gun.
Yes, the door is the key question here. Apartment dwellers don’t leave their doors unlocked and keys for one door (obviously) don’t open other doors except in exceptional circumstances.
So how did she get in and still think it was her place?
In Bricker’s hypo? Where she opens up her apartment, at 10 PM, sees a guy in there with the lights out, and the guy doesn’t obey her commands to stop and show his hands? I don’t even think she’d need to command him to stop, if a reasonable person in her position would think they didn’t have the time to do so. The use of force has to be reasonable, according to what a reasonable person in her position would believe necessary to either protect themselves against an imminent threat of serious bodily injury, or the commission of one of the crimes mentioned in either § 9.32 or 9.42. I’d think it reasonable to shoot an intruder, in my own darkened Texas apartment, at 10 PM, if that intruder constituted an imminent threat of injury. If I can’t see his hands, that counts as an imminent threat of injury.
(Aside, that’s one of the many reasons I carry a flashlight most places. And it’s great for finding stuff that falls between the seats, or these days, reading small print. A cop should be using a light in this situation, either on her weapon, or a handheld. I wonder why she didn’t?)
Anyway, Bricker’s hypo, I’d like to stress, is not what happened here.
But if the facts were as in Bricker’s hypo, then if she shoots him—then my guess, and IANAL, but I’m pretty sure that’s how it’s going to shake out—she’s going to be no-billed 10 times out of 10. I wouldn’t call it “a good kill”, but the Grand Jury is not going to indict her on that set of facts. If you want to trespass in someone else’s dwelling in the dark, Texas is not the state to do it in.
As far as “what’s in the nighttime” as far as Texas law is concerned, AIUI, the definition of “in the nighttime” comes from the Texas Transportation Code § 541.401, and reads:
https://codes.findlaw.com/tx/transportation-code/transp-sect-541-401.html
I know there’s got to be a case where when certain events happened, and were they in the “nighttime,” changed how the defendant’s conduct was viewed. For instance, it comes up a lot in hunting situations, as you aren’t supposed to hunt many game animals at night.
It’s not unknown for the Penal Code to borrow definitions from other parts of the various Texas Codes or Statutes, and to have those definitions recognized in caselaw. IIRC, before they sensibly defined the term “intoxication” at Texas Penal Code §49.01, to interpret the term in regards to what it meant for a concealed handgun license holder, you had to go to the Texas Government Code to get the definition.
As to the incident at hand, and the differing narratives coming out, I don’t think the Texas Rangers are corrupt. I don’t think that Dallas PD is necessarily corrupt, though they have two significant conflicts of interest that might get in the way of their objectively determining what happened: on the one hand, their municipal entity is going to have to pay through the nose if they find that their employee was criminally liable. On the other hand, if they find no probable cause or no true bill of indictment against the Officer, a chunk of their city may burn down from protests/riots.
I just think that Officer Guyger and her counsel have had several days to get a story together that matches the available evidence, and puts her in the best possible light. Unfortunately for her, were I on the jury, that story still means she’s criminally liable for her conduct.