Oscar Grant trial comes to an end
Johannes Mehserle, a white transit officer was accused of involuntary manslaughter on Thursday after shooting to death the 22 years old African American Oscar Grant. He was convicted for murdering the young man on an Oakland train platform in 2009. The jury had to choose between murder and charges of voluntary and involuntary manslaughter and the panel included eight women and four men, seven Whites, three were Latinos, one Asian-Pacific and one that declined to state his race. They accused Mehserle of involuntary manslaughter, which carries a sentence of maximum four years of detention. Police were expecting riots, so teams of police officers were placed on the streets of Oakland.
A crowd near Oakland City Hall wearing “don’t shoot” signs glued to they backs was very furious when they heard the verdict and some of them gathered in a circle and started praying. They were saying that there is no justice and that Oscar Grant was killed in cold blood.
The three weeks trial was a rare case of a police officer being accused for an on-duty killing and the witnesses encountered hearing the gunshot that killed Grant. 28 years old Johannes Mehserle says that he struggled with Grant and that he saw him searching for something in his pocket, so he decided to scare the victim with his Taser because he was afraid that he might have a weapon. Instead of the Taser, he pulled out his firearm.
