Update: Police Officer Acquitted On All Charges in Baltimore Death of Freddie Gray; City and State Were Prepared for Unrest, But Few Protests Were Without Violence

BALTIMORE, Maryland - Thursday, June 23, 2016 - A Baltimore City Police Officer considered the primary defendant among the six officers charged in the death of Freddie Gray, has been acquitted of all charges, including "depraved heart murder," by a Baltimore City Circuit Court Judge.  Officer Cesar Goodson was acquitted by Judge Barry Williams, the same judge who also acquitted the only other police officer whose case has come to a final decision.  A third officer, who chose a jury trial, saw his case end in a hung jury, and is scheduled to be retried.  The jury in that case was said to be split, 11-1, in favor of acquittal. 

Freddie Gray was a reputed drug dealer who was ensconced on an infamous street corner when a group of officers, some on bicycles, arrived on the scene.  Upon making eye contact with one of the bicycle officers, Gray fled but was apprehended and, when a search turned up a large knife, was arrested.  He claimed injury at various times in the immediate aftermath of his arrest, but other evidence produced in the trials indicated that Gray was not seriously injured until sometime after all but one of a series of stops that the police van transporting him was required to make.  When the van arrived at its final stop, however, Gray was unresponsive and was found to have broken his neck.  He died one week later in Maryland's Shock Trauma Unit in Baltimore.  The cause of his injury remains unresolved, although there was some evidence that Gray intentionally sought to in- jure himself.  Riots broke out after Gray's death and the Baltimore State's Attorney, Marian Mosbey, announced charges against all six police officers who responded to the scene of the arrest.  The second degree murder charge against Officer Goodson was by far the most serious.  

In making his announcement of acquittal Thursday morning, Judge Williams said that the State had never proved the premise of the charges against Officer Goodson: a so-called "rough ride" by the driver of the police van to punish the arrested person(s).  No person testified that Goodson drove in such a way so as to injure Mr. Gray.

Every arrested officer except Goodson has brought suit against Mosbey and others in federal court, claiming that the State's Attorney defamed the officers without just cause.  All of those civil suits are pending.

Testimony and closing arguments in the Goodson case ended on Tuesday, but Judge Williams announced that he would reveal his verdict Thursday morning.  There was speculation immediately that the Judge had decided to acquit and wanted to give Government Officials time to get their police and other government response units ready in case violence erupted.  By mid-afternoon on Thursday there had been protests but no violence.  Many Baltimore citizens were outright relieved that no violence ensued.

This writer had voiced criticism of Judge Williams' decision to keep the venue of the trial in Baltimore instead of moving it to another Maryland jurisdiction.  Defendants had argued for the change in venue because of the riots sparked by the death of Freddie Gray.  Baltimore was in a state of siege for many days and the National Guard was deployed after widespread rioting and looting and property destruction.  A string of arson fires also took place and many drug stores were looted and robbed of their supplies of narcotic drugs.  The Defendants argued that potential jurors would be intimidated by the riots into believing that unless they found the defendants guilty, further violence would ensue.  As it turned out, Judge Williams, and not this writer, was correct.