An appeals court has overturned the convictions of a former Georgia police officer who shot and killed an unarmed, naked man.
Robert “Chip” Olsen was responding to a call of a naked man behaving erratically at an Atlanta-area apartment complex in March 2015 when he killed 26-year-old Anthony Hill, a black Air Force veteran who’d been diagnosed with bipolar disorder and post-traumatic stress disorder. Olsen, who worked for the DeKalb County Police Department, said he was acting in self-defense.
A jury in 2019 found Olsen guilty of one count of aggravated assault, two counts of violating his oath of office and one count of making a false statement. But jurors found him not guilty on two counts of felony murder. He was sentenced to serve 12 years in prison, followed by eight years of probation.
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Prior to trial, Olsen’s lawyers had argued against the DeKalb County Police Department’s use of force policy being submitted as evidence. They said some of its provisions conflicted with Georgia’s self-defense law and that admitting it would confuse the jury.
The trial court was wrong to admit the policy into evidence without identifying and redacting the portions that conflict with Georgia law, state Court of Appeals Judge Brian Rickman wrote in a unanimous opinion Tuesday. That error was compounded, he wrote, when jurors were told the policy could be used “to assess the reasonableness” of Olsen’s using deadly force. The prosecution also said repeatedly during closing arguments that the policy provided the legal standard for determining whether Olsen’s use of force was reasonable.
Georgia law says the use of force that is intended or likely to cause death is justified if a person “reasonably believes that such force is necessary to prevent death or great bodily injury to himself or herself or a third person or to prevent the commission of a forcible felony.” That law “expressly…
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