The former Columbus, Ohio, police officer who murdered Andre Hill, a Black man who was shot dead in a garage in 2020 for the egregious crime of — *checks notes* — startling a cop while holding a cell phone, was sentenced to 15 years to life in prison on Monday. Predictably, the ex-officer is promising to appeal his conviction, and, despite this being one of the more cut-and-dry cases of cops killing unarmed Black people, he’s still clinging to the tried and true “I was in fear for my life” narrative that killer cops toss out reflexively to avoid accountability for police bias.
“I feel my actions were justified,” former officer Adam Coy said in court after he was sentenced for murder, reckless homicide and felonious assault. “I reacted the same way I had in hundreds of training scenarios. I drew and fired my weapon to stop a threat, protect myself and my partner.”
For those who are unfamiliar with the case, on Dec. 22, 2020, Coy, who was 19 at the time, responded to a call about an SUV left running on the street. While canvassing the area, Coy spotted Hill, 47, in the open garage of someone Hill was visiting. In body camera footage, Hill can be seen walking towards Coy and a second officer with his cell phone raised high in the air with the screen illuminated and facing the officers. Coy opened fire for seemingly no reason whatsoever and killed Hill. Even the second officer to arrive at the scene, Amy Detwiler, said she saw no reason for Coy to open fire as she “did not observe any threats” from Hill. In fact, after Coy shot Hill and, while Hill was lying on the ground dying, shouted at him to “put your f**king hands out to the side” and to “roll on your stomach, now,” he can be heard in the video instructing Detwiler not to help Hill, telling her, “Don’t get f**king close, I can’t see his hand.”…