[News] [DC, USA] Arraignment set for officer in trans shooting
Stephanie Stevens
Arraignment set for officer in trans shooting
By Lou Chibbaro Jr. on February 3, 2012
[Photo: <http://bit.ly/wT2py1> In Nov. D.C. trans residents and their
allies protest what they called bias on the part of Metropolitan
Police. (Blade file photo by Michael Key) ]
A D.C. Superior Court judge on Jan. 27 scheduled an arraignment in
March for a D.C. police officer charged with firing his gun while off
duty at three transgender women and two male friends while the five
sat in a car on a city street last August.
Court observers say the decision to schedule an arraignment indicates
negotiations between prosecutors and the attorney representing Officer
Kenneth Furr <http://www.washingtonblade.com/2011/09/05/probable-cause-found-that-off-duty-cop-fired-gun-at-trans-women/>
over a plea bargain offer have been unsuccessful. Furr is now expected
to be indicted by a grand jury within the next several weeks.
Police charged Furr, a 21-year veteran of the police force, with
assault with a dangerous weapon. Superior Court Judge Ann O’Regan
Keary ordered him held without bond pending trial at a Sept. 2 hearing
after finding probable cause that Furr committed the offense.
A police arrest affidavit says Furr allegedly stood on the hood of a
car where the victims were sitting
<http://www.washingtonblade.com/2011/08/27/off-duty-d-c-cop-arrested-for-shooting-trans-women/>
and fired his service revolver through the front windshield, hitting
two of the trans women and one of their male friends. All three
suffered non-life threatening wounds, but authorities said the three
could easily have been killed in the shooting.
The affidavit says the incident began when Furr allegedly solicited
one of the trans women for sex at a nearby CVS drugstore and became
angry when she refused the offer and her male friend intervened on her
behalf. Furr later threatened the male friend with a gun when the two
crossed paths outside the store, the affidavit says.
The male friend and the other victims followed Furr in their car as
Furr drove away from the store, saying they wanted to get his license
number and report him to police, the affidavit says. Furr allegedly
stopped his car and pulled out his gun when he noticed the other car
was following him, says the affidavit. The car driven by the male
friend of the trans women then crashed into Furr’s car, prompting Furr
to climb on the hood of that car and begin firing his gun at the
people inside.
The incident outraged LGBT activists, who said it came at a time when
transgender women had been victims of assaults and violent hate crimes
in a number of previous incidents.
© Copyright Brown, Naff, Pitts Omnimedia, Inc. 2012. All rights reserved.
http://www.washingtonblade.com/2012/02/03/arraignment-set-for-officer-in-trans-shooting/