Video raises questions on police shooting

May 18, 2010|ASSOCIATED PRESS

DETROIT — A lawyer for the family of a 7-year-old girl slain during a weekend raid at their Detroit home said yesterday that video footage contradicts the Police Department’s version of events.

Geoffrey Fieger said the video shows that police fired into the home at least once after lobbing a flash grenade through a window. He said that contradicts the department’s explanation that an officer’s gun fired during a confrontation with a resident inside the home.

Aiyana Jones, 7, was shot in the neck and died.

Police said they were trying to acquire the video shot by a television crew.

Wayne County Prosecutor Kym Worthy said yesterday that State Police will take over the investigation of the fatal shooting.

Aiyana was asleep on the living room sofa in her family’s apartment when Detroit police, searching for a homicide suspect, burst in and an officer’s gun went off, fatally striking the girl in the neck, family members said.

When her father, 25-year-old Charles Jones, rushed into the living room, police forced him to lie on the ground, with his face in his daughter’s blood, he said. “I’ll never be the same. That’s my only daughter,’’ Jones told WXYZ-TV.

Assistant Chief Ralph Godbee said officers set off the flash grenade as they entered the apartment with their guns drawn about 12:40 a.m. Sunday with a warrant to look for a suspect in the Friday slaying of a 17-year-old boy.