XPost: balt.general, alt.law-enforcement, sac.politics   
   XPost: soc.culture.african.american   
   From: whitey.wins@naacp.org   
      
   BALTIMORE — The acquittal Monday of a police officer charged in   
   the arrest of Freddie Gray, the black man who suffered a fatal   
   spinal cord injury while in police custody last year,   
   immediately renewed questions of whether any of the six police   
   officers charged in the case would be convicted in connection   
   with his death.   
      
   Officer Edward M. Nero’s acquittal on four charges for his role   
   in the opening moments of Mr. Gray’s arrest was a second blow to   
   the prosecution’s sweeping case, announced as Baltimore was   
   still seething after the unrest following Mr. Gray’s death in   
   April 2015. The first trial, against Officer William G. Porter,   
   ended in a hung jury in December, touching off legal maneuvers   
   that brought proceedings against the officers to a temporary   
   halt.   
      
   But legal experts said Judge Barry G. Williams’s finding was a   
   narrow one that does not forestall the possibility of   
   convictions against other officers charged in the case. They   
   said Judge Williams’s ruling turned not on a wholesale rejection   
   of prosecutors’ broad legal theory, but rather on his   
   determination that Officer Nero, 30, was a bit player in Mr.   
   Gray’s arrest.   
      
   Judge Williams, who ruled on the case after the officer opted to   
   forgo a jury trial, said in his verdict that there were other   
   officers who played — or who could have reasonably been expected   
   to play — a bigger role in the encounter. And while that is no   
   guarantee that other officers will be found guilty, it is those   
   officers who will stand trial in the coming months.   
      
   “The judge did seem to create a hierarchy of responsibility and   
   say that Officer Nero was at the bottom,” said David Jaros, a   
   professor of law at the University of Baltimore who has been   
   watching the case. “Now, let’s see as we go up whether or not   
   anyone else is sufficiently responsible as to be criminally   
   liable.”   
      
   Judge Williams read his verdict matter-of-factly while Officer   
   Nero stared straight ahead.   
      
   “There has been no information presented at this trial that the   
   defendant intended for any crime to happen,” Judge Williams said.   
      
   At the conclusion of his 30-minute explanation, he added, “The   
   verdict on each count is not guilty.” Officer Nero rose to his   
   feet and wiped away tears as his supporters — including Officer   
   Garrett E. Miller, who is also charged in the case — moved in to   
   embrace him.   
      
   http://www.nytimes.com/2016/05/24/us/baltimore-officer-edward-   
   nero-freddie-gray-court-verdict.html?_r=1   
      
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