Aaron Dean, a former Fort Worth police officer, was found guilty of manslaughter on Tuesday by the jury. Dean, who shot Atatiana Jefferson, 28, while she and her nephew were playing video games in her own home, was sentenced to 11 years and 10 months in prison.
Manslaughter Not Murder
After nearly two full days of deliberations, a jury handed down the verdict, which came just a few days after the same jurors had found Aaron Dean guilty of manslaughter but not murder for shooting Jefferson to death on October 12, 2019.
One day after finding Dean guilty of manslaughter, the jury deliberated on Dean’s punishment on Friday. During the punishment phase, the jury heard testimony from several character witnesses. Some of Jefferson’s supporters believed that Dean’s conviction for manslaughter was insufficient when it was announced last week; they shouted that it was murder, a source posted.
While Dean’s defense asked the jury to sentence him to probation rather than a prison term, the prosecution asked the jurors to give the former officer the maximum sentence of 20 years. The former police officer, 38, entered a not-guilty plea. For his manslaughter conviction, Dean faced a prison term of two to twenty years.
Community Reacts to Dean’s Verdict
After numerous delays in his trial, Dean’s verdict has been anxiously awaited for over three years. The jury chose to find the defendant guilty of manslaughter rather than murder, as the prosecution had requested.
Chris Nettles, a member of the Fort Worth city council who has been vocal about his opinions on the fatal shooting, was one of the first to comment on Dean’s sentence. Nettles expressed his dissatisfaction with the trial’s verdict in a forceful, passionate statement. The ruling, he claimed, is minimal, and Black people are sick of hearing that they should be more appreciative and see the positive side, wfaa.com wrote.
Sharen Wilson, the district attorney for Tarrant county, stated that she sympathized with Atatiana Jefferson’s family but that the jury’s verdict would not bring Jefferson back.
