Freddie Gray Verdict: Baltimore Officer Who Drove Van Not Guilty On All Charges…

Gray, who was 25, suf­fered a dev­as­tat­ing spinal injury and died in April 2015, about a week after he was arrest­ed and placed into a pris­on­er van that Goodson was driving.
Of the six offi­cers arrest­ed in the case, Goodson faced the most seri­ous charges. The sec­ond-degree depraved heart mur­der is a charge unique to a few states that implies that the defen­dant acts with extreme indif­fer­ence with regard to the human con­se­quences and per­ils of their actions.
The ver­dict is anoth­er set­back for State’s Attorney Marilyn Mosby, who dra­mat­i­cal­ly announced the charges against the six offi­cer last year from the broad steps of the down­town War Memorial.

The ‘rough ride’

Prosecutors alleged that after Gray was arrest­ed on a weapons charge, Goodson took him on a “rough ride” in a pris­on­er van — a puni­tive mea­sure police used against unruly subjects.
Freddie Gray
They said Goodson drove so rad­i­cal­ly that he blew through a stop sign and veered into anoth­er lane of traf­fic because of the speed he was trav­el­ing, which pros­e­cu­tors said would have tossed Gray around in the van. This is the point in the ride that pros­e­cu­tors think Gray sus­tained his fatal spinal injury.
The pros­e­cu­tion argued that Goodson failed on two accounts: fail­ing to put a seat belt on Gray when he was in the back of the van and neglect­ing to pro­vide Gray with prop­er med­ical assis­tance after Gray indi­cat­ed that he want­ed to go to the hospital.
Goodson was also charged with sec­ond-degree assault, mis­con­duct in office, invol­un­tary manslaugh­ter, manslaugh­ter by vehi­cles (gross neg­li­gence), manslaugh­ter by vehi­cle (crim­i­nal neg­li­gence) and reck­less endangerment.

Goodson’s defense

Defense attor­neys for Goodson argued that there is no evi­dence of that rough ride and that Gray’s injuries were caused in part by his own agi­ta­tion and thrash­ing around in the van.
Officer: Van driver was responsible for Freddie Gray
Officer: Van dri­ver was respon­si­ble for Freddie Gray 01:45
They said Gray was com­bat­ive and unco­op­er­a­tive and that Goodson used his judg­ment to not put a seat belt on Gray because he felt it was­n’t safe.
“We cer­tain­ly don’t want to speak poor­ly about the deceased, but Mr. Gray cre­at­ed the high-degree of risk,” defense attor­ney Matthew Fraling said dur­ing the bench trial.
The defense added that, although he asked to go to the hos­pi­tal, Gray nev­er showed symp­toms that would have called for imme­di­ate med­ical atten­tion, such as bleed­ing, bruis­ing or bro­ken limbs.
Over the sev­en-day tes­ti­mo­ny, the state called 21 wit­ness­es; the defense called on nine. Goodson did­n’t testify.
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