Ex-officer Aaron Dean sentenced to more than 11 years in prison in the death of Atatiana Jefferson

By Daniella Silva, NBC News

A white former Texas police officer who fatally shot a Black woman through a window of her home in October 2019 was sentenced to 11 years and 10 months in prison Tuesday.

The former officer, Aaron Dean, was found guilty of manslaughter Thursday in the fatal shooting of Atatiana Jefferson, 28, who had been playing video games at home with her 8-year-old nephew. Dean was responding to Jefferson’s home after a neighbor had called a nonemergency line around 2 a.m. to say he had noticed an open front door.

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Kyle Clayton, the psychologist, told jurors that he had concluded that Dean “was not psychologically suitable to serve as a police officer” and that an evaluation suggested that Dean “had a narcissistic personality style” that would inhibit his judgment and “make him more likely to engage in behaviors that could put himself and others at risk.”

Adarius Carr, Jefferson’s oldest brother, testified that his sister was a caring woman who moved back home to Fort Worth and cared for her nephew because the boy’s mother and grandmother were both in the hospital with heart problems.

The jury, which deliberated about 13 hours before it delivered the manslaughter verdict, rejected a murder charge that could have sent Dean to prison for life. Dean faced two to 20 years in prison on the manslaughter conviction. Prosecutors had asked jurors to sentence him to the maximum. The defense argued for probation.

Keep reading about the trial.

Dean is the latest officer to be convicted of violence against Black Americans. In other cases, law enforcement agreed to financial settlements.

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