Elijah McClain’s death at the hands of suburban Denver police and paramedics was much in the news as Black Lives Matter protests happened in 2020.
Now, the last sentence for the three police officers and two paramedics involved the young Black man’s death has been handed down.
On Friday, Aurora Fire department medic Jeremy Cooper, who administered the fatal dose of ketamine to McClain was sentenced to 14 months in jail and work release.
In a previous trial, Cooper’s boss Peter Chinicac got five years in prison.
Two of the police officers were acquitted, but Officer Randy Roedema was sentenced to 14 months in jail, and four years probation.
“The life of Elijah McClain mattered and matters,” Judge Mark Warner, who heard all the cases, said at Cooper’s sentencing.
“It’s almost unthinkable – a young man died for really no reason,” Warner said. “It occurs to the court it didn’t have to happen. It could have turned out much differently.”
McClain’s fatal encounter with police happened on the corner of Evergreen Avenue and Billings Street. The intersection is up against a highway and there’s a huge concrete wall that lines one side of the street, with low-slung apartment buildings on the other side. There is an aging artificial flower memorial up against the highway barrier in memory of McClain.