The family of a 25-year-old Washington, D.C., Special Police Officer plans to file a civil lawsuit after she was killed by friendly fire during a police training session in 2022.
A retired D.C. lieutenant who shot her was criminally charged and sentenced to three years in prison, but the family believes the city should share responsibility for her loss of life, and his sentence was too lenient.
Maurica Manyan, a mother of one, attended a baton training conducted by former police officer Jesse Porter at the Anacostia Library on Aug. 4, 2022. The 59-year-old, though no longer an active officer, was hired as a private contractor to train the officers.
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A new video released by The KLK Law Firm shows that at the end of this meeting, the class poses for a picture to commemorate the day. After the photograph was snapped, Porter stepped away from the group still huddled, turned around, and shot his handgun. The bullet fatally wounded Manyan with a single bullet to the chest.
Porter said it was a prank gone wrong, and he did not mean for the gun to go off.
“He did not have any criminal intent, that it was not his intent to cause any harm to her on that day. He’s acknowledged that what it is that he did was negligent. But it wasn’t criminal. But he also accepted responsibility,” Brian McDaniel, Porter’s attorney, said to Fox 5.
One witness said they heard Porter say, “I thought I had my training gun. Why did I do this? Is she OK?”
WATCH THE VIDEO HERE.
Immediately after Manyan was shot, Porter and another person unsuccessfully attempted to perform life-saving measures on her.
Latoya Francis-Williams is representing Manyan’s family and says that the estate decided to file the lawsuit after it was established that Porter shot the woman in his capacity as a…
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