LOS ANGELES (CN) — A federal judge has denied qualified immunity to two Los Angeles Police Department officers who shot an unarmed man in a 2022 encounter, allowing an excessive force lawsuit to move forward.
In a ruling issued Tuesday, U.S. District Judge Otis Wright found that body camera footage contradicted officers’ claims that Jermaine Petit posed an immediate threat, showing him walking away from police with his hands visible when two of three responding officers opened fire, injuring but not killing him.
The July 18, 2022, shooting followed a dispatch call describing Petit as a transient carrying a stick and lighting trash on fire in a residential neighborhood. Petit was a 39-year-old Air Force veteran who was diagnosed with schizophrenia and post-traumatic stress disorder, according to his daughter, Ashlyn Petit, who sued the police department on his behalf in 2023…