One year after the killing of 26-year-old Manuel Esteban Paez Teran, a protester shot and killed by Georgia State Troopers at a campground near the site of the controversial Cop City Training Center in 2023, opponents of the nearly completed project continue to call for justice for the slain activist.
Conflicting reports from medical examiners have determined that Teran was shot multiple times from multiple guns. The official autopsy conducted by the DeKalb County Medical Examiner’s Office said Teran was shot 13 times by multiple different guns. However, on April 20, 2023, a Dekalb County medical examiner revealed that Teran was shot 57 times with wounds in his head, torso, hands, and legs.
The family’s independent autopsy report concluded Teran’s hands were raised and facing multiple individuals at the time of the shooting.
“Both Manuel’s left and right hands show exit wounds in both palms. The autopsy further reveals that Manuel was most probably in a seated position, cross-legged when killed,” the family’s attorney expressed in a release in March 2023.
The killing of Manuel Teran is unprecedented in the history of environmental activism. Keith Woodhouse, professor of history at Northwestern University, said, “Killings of environmental activists by the state are depressingly common in other countries like Brazil, Honduras, and Nigeria, but this has never happened in the U.S.”
A Stone Mountain, Georgia judge ruled that none of the Georgia State Troopers involved in the killing of Manuel Teran would face charges in the killing.
Stone Mountain Judicial Circuit District Attorney George R. Christian released a statement detailing the findings of…
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