‘Killing Was Not Justified’: Michigan Judge Rejects Motion for Mistrial In Murder Trial of Ex-Cop Who Fatally Shot Black Man In Back of Head
A judge has denied a mistrial request from the defense team representing a former Michigan officer accused of murdering a Black man after fatally shooting him in 2022.
Former Grand Rapids Officer Christopher Schurr is currently on trial for second-degree murder in connection with the shooting death of 26-year-old Patrick Lyoya.
Schurr shot Lyoya, a Congolese immigrant, during a traffic stop on April 4, 2022.
The former cop pulled Lyoya over that day because the license plate on his car didn’t match the vehicle. During their encounter, a physical struggle ensued.
Footage released by police shows Schurr tackling Lyoya to the ground and making several attempts to detain him on the front lawn of a home. Authorities say that Lyoya grabbed Schurr’s Taser at one point, which Schurr had tried to discharge earlier but missed.
Cellphone video showed Schurr managing to gain the upper hand in the scuffle, climbing on top of Lyoya, who ended up face down on the ground. At that point, Schurr grabbed his gun and fired one fatal shot to the back of Lyoya’s head.
Schurr’s legal team attempted to bring his murder trial this week to a swift close with a motion for a mistrial. After the prosecution rested its case, defense attorney Mikayla Hamilton contested the testimonies of the use-of-force experts prosecutors called to the stand, who argued that a reasonable officer in Schurr’s position would not have killed Lyoya.
Hamilton stated that the experts relied on outdated policies and “20/20 hindsight” about tactical procedures and lacked knowledge on Michigan law and Grand Rapid Police’s current training practices, local news outlets reported.
“As they both admitted, they don’t know what Michigan law is and that are not within knowledge and in the situation of the arresting officer, based on tactical considerations that are not ultimately at issue in this case, including what everything that led up to the ultimate issue here, which, which is whether officer had an honest and reasonable belief to be in fear of having a great, serious bodily injury at the moment that he decided to use deadly force,” Hamilton said, according to WZZM13.
She requested that the testimony be stricken from the court and requested a mistrial. In a separate motion, Hamilton sought a direct acquittal in the court proceedings.
Kent County Prosecutor Christopher Becker challenged the motion, arguing that the subject matter experts’ opinions were based on how a reasonable officer would have responded to the situation.
“I think there’s no reason to grant a mistrial because they talk about objective reasonableness,” Becker said. “That’s the jury’s role in terms of determining whether somebody’s engaged in self-defense. And that’s a question for the jury.”
The judge rejected the defense’s motions, noting that while Lyoya might have gained control of Schurr’s Taser, a jury could find that he was not in a position to deploy it before he was shot, MLive.com reported.
“I do not believe that the experts’ testimony rises to the level of requiring a mistrial,” Judge Christina Mims said. “I believe a rational trier of fact could find that the killing was not justified. And so, because that is the position of the court, I am denying a direct acquittal for those reasons, because I do not believe it to be appropriate under the circumstances.”
The trial entered its fourth day on May 1 with defense attorneys calling their witnesses and subject matter experts to the stand.