Jury acquits Tacoma, Wash., officers in death of Manuel Ellis

A jury cleared the three policemen of all criminal charges on Thursday. The charges were related to the 2020 death of Manuel Ellis. The officers had used a Taser to subdue him and pinned him face-down on the sidewalk. The officers’ attorneys argued that Ellis had a lethal amount of methamphetamine in his system and had suffered from a preexisting heart condition before the officers stopped him. Two of the officers, Christopher Burbank and Matthew Collins, faced murder and manslaughter charges, and the third, Timothy Rankine, faced a manslaughter charge during a two-month trial.  

How did people react to the verdict? The Seattle Times quoted Collins’ attorney, Casey Arbenz, as reflecting that jurors were willing to look beyond a video of the incident. Some of Ellis’ family members joined a crowd of about 100 near a Tacoma memorial Thursday evening, temporarily blocking an intersection.

 Dig deeper: Read Leo Briceno’s report in The Stew about a proposal in Colorado to address police brutality.