In the early hours of August 30 in Columbus, Ohio, Officer Ricky Anderson shot and killed an unarmed Black man. At two in the morning, police showed up at Donovan Lewis’ residence to execute a felony domestic assault warrant. When Anderson fatally shot the 20-year-old, he was unarmed and lying in bed with nothing but a vape pen. WSYXreports the cop fired immediately at the unarmed man because he “believed his life was in danger.”
“He was devastated that he was placed in a situation where he had to use lethal force. As a parent himself, his heart goes out to the Lewis family. The human eye captures things differently than a body camera. There are different angles and stuff like that. But tactically everything that was done prior is sound. Everything that was done was by his training,” according to defense attorney Mark Collins.
“Sometimes they are in a situation where they have to make a split-second decision. And in this situation, Anderson believed what he saw was a gun, and so that is why he fired because he believed his life was in danger,” he predictably said.
“Of course, he was mistaken, that it was not a gun,” Collins continued. “But was that mistake reasonable? The Supreme Court cases and the jury instructions give deference to police officers in these type of situations because all across America everyday officers are in those situations.”
“Our client definitely saw something in his hand and case law in these type of cases indicate that you don’t even need something in the hand. I believe in this situation the protocols that were followed were textbook,” Collins said.
“Meaning the officers who were there initially to serve the lawful warrant did what they did. They believed someone was in there. They didn’t just go barging in. They didn’t go in a rush. They said what is our next step and tactically speaking the next step is to try to use the canine.”
He continued, “Knowing what Rick Anderson knew at that time, when in that situation, based on the totality of the situation, any reasonable officer could do the same type of action.”
Rex Elliott, attorney for the Lewis’ family, said there was no justification to shoot Donovan. Police didn’t find any guns at the scene. “Officer Anderson opened the door and almost immediately fired a shot into the bedroom as Donovan was trying to get out of bed,” he explained.
