Court to hear appeal of Amber Guyger, Dallas ex-cop who killed Black neighbor in his home

DALLAS —  A Texas court is scheduled to hear arguments Tuesday on overturning the conviction of a former Dallas police officer who was sentenced to prison for fatally shooting her neighbor in his own home.

An attorney for Amber Guyger and prosecutors are set to clash before an appeals court over whether the evidence was sufficient to prove that her 2018 shooting of Botham Jean was murder.

The hearing before a panel of judges will examine a Dallas County jury’s 2019 decision to sentence Guyger to 10 years in prison for murder. It comes as a jury’s verdict that former Minneapolis Police Officer Derek Chauvin murdered George Floyd has again focused national attention on police killings of people of color.

More than two years before Floyd’s death last May set off protests across the country, Guyger’s killing of Jean drew national attention because of the strange circumstances and because it was one in a string of shootings of Black men by white police officers.

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The sentencing came a day after the jury convicted former officer Amber Guyger of murder in the September 2018 killing of Botham Jean.

Oct. 2, 2019

The basic facts of the case were not in dispute. Guyger, returning home from a long shift, mistook Jean’s apartment for her own, which was on the floor directly below his. Finding the door ajar, she entered and shot him, later testifying that she thought he was a burglar.

Jean, a 26-year-old accountant, had been eating a bowl of ice cream before Guyger shot him. She was later fired from the Dallas Police Department.

The appeal from Guyger, now 32, hangs on the contention that her mistaking Jean’s apartment for her own was reasonable and, therefore, the shooting was as well. Her lawyers have asked the appeals court to acquit her of murder or to substitute a conviction for criminally negligent homicide, which carries a lesser sentence.

In court filings, Dallas County prosecutors countered that Guyger’s error doesn’t negate “her culpable mental state.” They wrote: “Murder is a result-oriented offense.”