Michael Owen Jr., the first Prince George’s County , Md., police officer to be charged with murder for actions in uniform, was found not guilty on all the counts he faced in the fatal shooting of a handcuffed man, including second-degree murder and voluntary manslaughter, reports the Washington Post. The case hinged on whether Owen, who fatally shot 43-year-old William Green six times while the man had his hands cuffed behind his back, pulled the trigger in self-defense in the 2020 shooting. Prosecutors argued that Green, who had been found earlier passed out in a car, posed no threat and that Owen failed to “respect the sanctity of human life” by firing his service weapon at the man. Owen, who testified in his own defense and had fatally shot someone earlier in his career, asserted that there was a violent struggle in the car and that he shot Green to protect himself.
The jury, which heard five days of testimony, also found Owen not guilty of assault, use of a handgun in commission of a felony and misconduct in office. As the verdict was being read, a commotion broke out in the courtroom. Family from both sides burst into shouts and wails. One woman collapsed and vomited, and one man was punched and knocked unconscious. The man who punched him was detained by sheriff’s deputies. “I can’t believe that man killed my son and got away with it,” Green’s mother, Brenda Green, said before later remarking in disbelief, “Oh my God, they let that murderer off scot-free and mark my word he’s going to kill somebody else because he’s done it before.” The verdict is the culmination of a criminal case four years in the making, delayed by the coronavirus pandemic, court issues and a proposed plea deal offered to Owen by the state’s attorney’s office. That plea deal was made public by the victim’s family and then rejected by Judge Michael Pearson.
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