Supreme Court rejects appeal from Texas officer convicted of killing woman through her window

WASHINGTON – The Supreme Court will not hear the appeal of a former Texas police officer convicted in the death of a woman who was shot through a window of her home.

The justices did not elaborate on their reasoning, as is typical, and none publicly disagreed.

Aaron Dean was convicted of manslaughter in the fatal shooting of Atatiana Jefferson and sentenced to nearly 12 years in prison. Dean was originally charged with murder. On appeal, he argued that prosecutors were not allowed to ask the jury to consider the lesser charge at the end of the trial.

Dean, a white man, shot and killed Jefferson, a 28-year-old black woman, on October 12, 2019, after a neighbor called the police emergency number to report that the front door of Jefferson’s home was open.

It later emerged that Jefferson and her nephew had left the doors open to let out smoke after he burned hamburgers, and that the two had been up late playing video games.

Dean’s guilty verdict was a rare conviction of an officer for killing a person who was also armed with a gun.

The main issue at trial was whether Dean knew Jefferson was armed. Dean stated that he saw her gun. Prosecutors said the evidence showed otherwise.

Body camera footage showed that Dean and a second officer who responded to the call did not identify themselves as police officers inside the home. Dean and the other officer testified that they thought the house might have been burglarized and quietly retreated to the fenced-in backyard to look for signs of a break-in.

There, Dean, his gun drawn, fired a single shot through the window, moments after yelling at Jefferson, who was inside, to show her hands.

Jefferson’s nephew testified that she pulled out her gun because she believed there was an intruder in the backyard.