Wolfe City Police Officer Charged With Fatal Shooting Of Black Man Jonathan Price

Topline

A white police officer accused of fatally shooting 31-year-old Black man Jonathan Price at a Texas gas station on Saturday, moments after using a Taser on him, has been arrested and charged with his murder, law enforcement officials said on Monday.

Key Facts

Chief Critic

Baseball player Will Middlebrooks, who says he was friends with Price and who has raised tens of thousands through a crowdfunding campaign for Price’s family, said in a Facebook post on Sunday: “See this face? This is the face of one of my childhood friends. The face of my first ever favorite teammate. The face of a good man. But unfortunately it’s the face of a man whose life was taken away from him last night with his hands in the air, while a small town East Texas cop shot him dead.”

Key Background

Following the devastating death of George Floyd in police custody on Memorial Day, footage of which shook the nation and the world and led to global Black Lives Matter protests, a spotlight has been renewed on the treatment and killing of Black people at the hands of police. Several cases have drawn national and global attention, including the fatal shooting of 26-year-old emergency technician, Breonna Taylor, who died after police entered her home using a no-knock warrant and shot her several times in March. Scarce prominent cases in recent years have resulted in charges and subsequent prosecutions, including Taylor’s case, which last month saw a grand jury decided not to indict the three officers involved in her death, Jonathan Mattingly, Brett Hankison, and Myles Cosgrove with murder, as campaigners had hoped. 

Further Reading

Texas Police Officer Charged With Murder in Fatal Shooting of Black Man (New York Times)