Murder of Botham Jean


On September 6, 2018, off-duty Dallas Police Department patrol officer Amber Guyger entered the Dallas, Texas, apartment of 26-year-old accountant Botham Jean and fatally shot him. Guyger said that she had entered the apartment believing it was her own and that she shot Jean believing he was a burglar. The fact that Guyger, a white police officer, shot and killed Jean, an unarmed black man, and was initially only charged with manslaughter, resulted in protests and accusations of racial bias. On October 1, 2019, Guyger was found guilty of murder. The next day, she received a sentence of ten years in prison.

Shooting

Guyger's apartment was on the third floor, directly below Jean's apartment on the fourth, in an apartment building with mostly identical floor plans on each level. Guyger testified that she thought the apartment was her own, and that she found the door slightly ajar, and she testified that she thought Jean was an intruder in the darkened living room of her apartment—when in fact Jean was killed in his own apartment, eating ice cream. She claimed she feared Jean would kill her. Jean was unarmed.
After Guyger shot Jean, she called 9-1-1. Jean was taken to a nearby hospital, where he died from his wound. The Texas Rangers investigated the shooting, which led to Guyger's arrest three days later.
Guyger was initially charged with manslaughter, but was later charged with murder. The initial charge of manslaughter and the racial aspect of the shooting resulted in protests in the following days.
The Dallas Police Department placed Guyger on administrative leave after the shooting. The department fired her on September 24, 2018.

Victim

Botham Shem Jean, a 26-year-old black man, was a Harding University alumnus and an accountant for PricewaterhouseCoopers. Jean was born in Saint Lucia.
Following the shooting, an attorney representing Jean's family accused the Dallas police department of attempting to smear Jean's reputation based on a police affidavit showing that police seized 10.4 grams of marijuana from Jean's apartment. The lawyers also disputed the account of the incident that Guyger told officials, which was recorded in the arrest warrant affidavit, and asserted that two independent witnesses had come forward to give recollections that conflicted with Guyger's account. An attorney for Jean asserted that witnesses claimed they heard knocking on the door to Jean's apartment and that a witness claimed they heard a woman's voice saying "Let me in, let me in."

Perpetrator

Amber Renée Guyger was 30 years old at the time of the shooting. She had been on the Dallas police force for almost five years.

Trial

On November 30, 2018, Guyger was indicted on murder charges by a Dallas County grand jury. On September 22, 2019, the day before the trial began, Dallas County District Attorney John Creuzot took part in an interview regarding the trial in spite of a gag order issued by Judge Tammy Kemp in January of that year. After questioning jurors, who reported that they had not seen the interview or other media coverage of the trial, Kemp denied the defense's motion for a mistrial, and sequestered the jury.
Manslaughter charges would have required proof of recklessness, while murder charges require proof that the defendant killed with intent. The prosecutors alleged criminal intent for two reasons: firstly, they said her arrival at the wrong apartment was not caused by tiredness, but rather caused by the conversation she had immediately prior with her lover trying to arrange a meeting that night, and secondly that she did not follow standard police protocol of not entering a building with a potential burglar inside and instead calling for backup from the police station, which was two blocks away.
On October 1, 2019, Guyger was found guilty of murder. The jury deliberated for six hours to reach the verdict of murder. The jurors also considered the lesser charge of manslaughter. She was the first Dallas police officer to be convicted of murder since the 1973 murder of Santos Rodriguez.
On October 2, 2019, Guyger was sentenced to 10 years in prison after the jury deliberated for an hour. During the sentencing hearing, Jean's mother Allison provided emotional testimony and some of Guyger's text messages and social media posts that were "racist and offensive" were shared. Jean's younger brother Brandt forgave and hugged Guyger during her sentencing. Jean's father Bertrum also stated that he forgave Guyger but had wanted a stiffer sentence. Trial judge Tammy Kemp, who is also African-American, drew controversy when she embraced Guyger and handed her a Bible, with the Freedom from Religion Foundation criticizing her for alleged proselytizing.
On October 16, 2019, Guyger's attorneys filed a notice of appeal requesting a new trial. Guyger is currently imprisoned in the Mountain View Correctional Center.

Aftermath

On January 31, 2019, ABC News reported that one witness, identified as "Bunny", provided video evidence of the aftermath of the shooting to the Dallas County District Attorney's Office, in addition to publishing it online. She said that as a result of the video, she received harassment and death threats. She also said that the pharmaceutical company she worked at terminated her after various phone calls to the company calling her a "radical", "anti-police" and "a black extremist", and that the company revoked her credentials.
On October 4, 2019, at 10:40 pm, prosecution witness and Jean's across-the-hall neighbor, Joshua Brown, was shot and killed in an apartment complex parking lot. He was pronounced dead at Parkland Memorial Hospital. Despite social media rumors that Brown was killed at the same apartment where Guyger shot Jean, he was killed at an apartment complex he had moved to, about five miles from where Jean and Guyger had lived. Witnesses could not identify the physical features of the shooter or shooters, but said they saw them speed out of the parking lot in a silver four-door sedan after firing multiple gunshots at Brown. Dallas County Judge Clay Jenkins also stated that while Brown was shot more than once, it was not in either the mouth or head as rumored on social media. Dallas Mayor Eric Johnson encouraged people to come forward with information that could provide help with the ongoing investigation.
On October 8, Dallas Police announced that they had identified three suspects in Brown's killing and had arrested one of them, and that the suspects had been involved in a drug deal with Brown that turned deadly. They said that after searching Brown's apartment, they had confiscated 12 pounds of marijuana, 143 grams of THC cartridges and $4,000 in cash. Brown's attorney said he was glad that the Dallas Police had apprehended suspects but called for an independent investigation by another agency. Clint Smith of the think tank New America and radio host Zerlina Maxwell expressed doubt that three men would travel 300 miles to purchase drugs from Brown. A second suspect was arrested the next day, and on December 8, all three men were indicted on charges of capital murder, although one of them remained at large.