The family of 39-year-old Tyrea Pryor is suing a city in Missouri and two of the town’s officers after those cops shot and killed Pryor last year while he was injured and pinned in a wrecked vehicle.
The lawyers for the mothers of Pryor’s children filed a wrongful death lawsuit on May 11 against the city of Independence, Missouri, and the cops who shot Pryor — Jamie Welsh and Hunter Soule.
According to the suit, those officers unloaded 15 gunshots on Pryor on March 11, 2022, at the scene of a car crash Pryor was involved in. While police did discover a rifle in Pryor’s car, they didn’t open fire until Welsh yelled that he saw Pryor with another weapon that wasn’t actually there.
Pryor’s family is being represented by attorneys Harry Daniels, John Burris, Arimeta DuPree, and Henry W. Tanner Jr. The suit cites that both Welsh and Soule used “unlawful and deadly force” against Pryor. The family is also claiming wrongful survival, battery, assault, and negligence.
Related: ‘We’ve Seen It Too Many Times’: Ohio Grand Jury Decides Cops Are Justified In Shooting at Black Man 90 Times As He Fled During Traffic Stop
“This wasn’t some tragic mistake,” Daniels stated on the family’s behalf. “Officers Welsh and Soule made a conscious and deliberate decision to fire 15 shots that not only killed Tyrea Pryor while he was unarmed, immobile and defenseless, but almost killed an innocent bystander and their fellow officer.”
Previously, the family petitioned Jackson County Prosecutor Jean Peters Baker to bring the case to a grand jury and indict the two officers involved. Since Baker hasn’t introduced any charges, the family has requested the Justice Department open an investigation.
“From Tyrea Pryor to Oscar Grant, we’ve seen the same thing again and again,” said Burris, whose previous clients include Rodney King as well as the family of Oscar Grant, whose death at the hands of Bay Area Rapid Transit police…
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