FORT WORTH, Texas (AP) — A former Texas police officer was convicted of manslaughter Thursday for fatally shooting a Black woman through a rear window of her home in 2019, a rare conviction of an officer for killing someone also armed with a gun.
Jurors were also considering a murder charge against Aaron Dean but instead convicted him of manslaughter in the death of Atatiana Jefferson. The conviction comes more than three years after the white Fort Worth officer shot the 28-year-old woman while responding to a call about an open front door.
Dean, 38, faces up to 20 years in prison on the manslaughter conviction. The sentencing phase of his trial is set to begin Friday. Dean had faced up to life in prison if convicted of murder.
This undated photo provided by Jefferson’s family shows Atatiana Jefferson. A white Fort Worth police officer who shot and killed Jefferson through a back window of her home while responding to a call about an open front door acted without justification and resigned Monday, Oct. 14, 2019, before he could be fired, the police chief said. (Jefferson’s family via AP)
The Tarrant County jury deliberated for more than 13 hours of deliberation over two days before returning the verdict. The primary dispute during the six days of testimony and arguments was whether Dean knew Jefferson was armed when he shot her. Dean testified that he saw her weapon; prosecutors alleged the evidence showed otherwise.
Dean shot Jefferson on Oct. 12, 2019, after a neighbor called a nonemergency police line to report that the front door to Jefferson’s home was open. She had been playing video games that night with her nephew and it emerged at trial that they left the doors open to vent smoke from hamburgers the boy burned.
WATCH: Killed While Babysitting Trial: Neighbor Who Called 911 Testifies
The case was unusual for the relative speed with which, amid public outrage, the Fort Worth Police Department released video of the shooting and arrested Dean. He’d completed the police academy the year before and quit the force without speaking to investigators.
Since then, the case had been repeatedly postponed amid lawyerly wrangling, the terminal illness of Dean’s lead attorney and the COVID-19 pandemic.
Police body camera footage showed that Dean and a second officer who responded to the call didn’t identify themselves as police at the house. Dean and Officer Carol Darch testified that they thought the house might have been burglarized and quietly moved into the fenced-off backyard looking for signs of forced entry.
WATCH: Killed While Babysitting Trial: Jury Sees Bodycam of Shooting
Former Fort Worth Police Officer Aaron Dean looks towards his attorneys during the second day of his murder trial on Tuesday, Dec. 6, 2022, in Fort Worth, Texas. Dean is accused of fatally shooting Atatiana Jefferson in 2019 during a welfare check. (Amanda McCoy/Star-Telegram via AP, Pool)
There, Dean, whose gun was drawn, fired a single shot through the window a split-second after shouting at Jefferson, who was inside, to show her hands.
Dean testified that he had no choice but to shoot when he saw Jefferson pointing the barrel of a gun directly at him. But under questioning from prosecutors he acknowledged numerous errors, repeatedly conceding that actions he took before and after the shooting were “more bad police work.”
Darch’s back was to the window when Dean shot, but she testified that he never mentioned seeing a gun before he pulled the trigger and didn’t say anything about the weapon as they rushed in to search the house.
READ MORE: TX v. Aaron Dean Trial Highlights
Zion Carr, 11, testifies during the murder trial of former Fort Worth Police Officer Aaron Dean on Monday, Dec. 5, 2022, in Fort Worth, Texas. Carr is Atatiana Jefferson’s nephew and was present when she was shot and killed by Dean through a windown in her own Fort Worth home in 2019. (Amanda McCoy/Star-Telegram via AP, Pool)
Dean acknowledged on the witness stand that he only said something about the gun after seeing it on the floor inside the house and that he never gave Jefferson first aid.
Jefferson’s 8-year-old nephew, Zion Carr, was in the room with his aunt when she was shot. Zion testified that Jefferson took out her gun believing there was an intruder in the backyard, but he offered contradictory accounts of whether she pointed the pistol out the window.
WATCH: Killed While Babysitting Trial: Victim’s Nephew Recalls Night of Murder
On the trial’s opening day, the now-11-year-old Zion testified that Jefferson always had the gun pointed down, but in an interview that was recorded soon after the shooting and played in court, he said she had pointed the weapon at the window.
