Milwaukee Cop Acquitted In Fatal Shooting Of Sylville Smith

By Rachel Cromidas in News on Jun 21, 2017 10:07PM

Photo: Darren Hauck / Getty Images

Officer Dominique Heaggan-Brown, who was fired from his police department last fall, was charged with reckless homicide in the killing, which fueled two days of protests in Milwaukee as well as ongoing national outrage over police officers using excessive force to injure or kill people of color.

Heaggan-Brown shot Smith in August of 2016 after the officer and his partner stopped Smith on the street, suspecting that he was involved in a drug deal. Smith, who was armed with a handgun, ran from the officers until he reached a fence. He then threw his gun over the fence, according to dashcam footage of the encounter. At that moment, Heaggan-Brown fired at him, hitting his right arm. Smith fell to the ground, where Heaggan-Brown shot at him again, striking him in the chest.

Prosecutors had argued before a jury that the first shot was reasonable, but the second shot was not, because Heaggan-Brown had no reason to fear for his life once Smith was on the ground, unarmed. The officer's defense attorneys argued that he was in fact following police procedure at every step of the incident—particularly a policy that told officers to expect that a suspect with one weapon might have another.

Heaggan-Brown was fired from the Milwaukee Police Department last fall on sexual assault charges, according to the New York Times. The officer is going to face a jury trial in August for the sexual assault charges, which follow a disturbing narrative: Heaggan-Brown allegedly had been drinking heavily at a bar the night after Smith's shooting, where he "bragged about being able to do whatever without repercussions" to a man whom he later sexually assaulted. The following morning Heaggan-Brown reportedly left the man at a Milwaukee area hospital, then text a Police Department superior to say he had made a mistake and wanted "to handle this in the most secret and right way possible."