Louisiana trooper avoids jail time in fatal arrest of black motorist Ronald Greene

FARMERVILLE, La. (AP) – A Louisiana state trooper pleaded no contest Monday to a significant reduction in charges, saving him jail time in the fatal 2019 arrest of Black motorist Ronald Greenethe first conviction of any kind in a lengthy police brutality case that once sparked national outrage.

Kory York faced the most serious charges of five officers charged in the case two years ago body camera video captured him Grabbing Greene by his ankle cuffs and forcing him to lie handcuffed and face down before he stopped breathing.

But instead of the original charge of manslaughter and criminal negligence, York pleaded no contest to a misdemeanor charge in exchange for a year of probation and an agreement to testify against the only officer still before the judge.

The plea came despite strong objections from Greene’s family, who said they were misled about the terms of the deal and denied the opportunity to see the charges unfold at trial.

“My family is a victim and we should have more of a say,” said Greene’s mother, Mona Hardin, who refused to sign the last-minute deal prosecutors pushed, fearing York would be acquitted in a conservative corner of the state . .

“This cannot end today,” she told the packed courtroom. ‘It’s wrong. It’s unfair.”

District Attorney John Belton declined Monday to say whether justice had been served in Greene’s death, noting the case remains open.

York’s no contest plea is effectively equivalent to a guilty plea, but the conviction cannot be used in the wrongful death lawsuit filed by Greene’s family. York, 51, will also keep his pension of nearly $83,000 a year after his August retirement from the Louisiana State Police.

“This is clearly a victory for Kory York,” said his attorney Mike Small. “It’s not an admission of guilt.”

It was a dramatic anticlimax for a case once shrouded in scandal, including allegations of state police cover-ups and institutional racism, which spawned two still-unresolved federal investigations. In a feverish state, then governor. John Bel Edwards called Greene’s treatment criminal and racist, and Republican lawmakers threatened to impeach the Democrat over his handling of the case, only to abandon a legislative investigation without even questioning him.

Greene’s death in May 2019 was suspicious from the start when state authorities told grieving relatives that he died in a car crash at the end of a high-speed chase near Monroe — a story that was immediately questioned by a doctor at the first aid. Yet the state police crash report omitted any mention of soldiers using force, and 462 days passed before state police launched an internal investigation. All the while, Edwards officials refused to release the body camera video.

But in 2021, The Associated Press obtained and published the footage shows soldiers surrounding Greene as he appeared to raise his hands, beg for mercy and whimper, “I am your brother! I’m scared!”

Troopers repeatedly shocked him with stun guns, with one wrestling him to the ground, putting him in a chokehold and punching him in the face. One soldier hit Greene in the head with a flashlight and was filmed bragging that he “beat the ever-living motherfucker out of him.” That officer, Chris Hollingsworth, was considered the most culpable of the six officers involved in the arrest, but died in 2020 in a single-vehicle accident hours after learning he was being fired.

York was seen on the video pinning the handcuffed, heavyset Greene face down on the ground for several minutes and repeatedly ordering him to “shut up” and “get down on your damn stomach like I told you !” Experts said such restraint could have dangerously restricted Greene’s breathing.

Although state police suspended York for 50 hours for his role in Greene’s arrest, investigators were never able to determine what caused the 49-year-old’s death. Autopsy reports cited several contributing factors, including the troopers’ repeated use of a stun gun, physical struggle, prone restraint, blunt force injuries and “complications of cocaine use,” with a forensic pathologist declining to identify which was the most fatal .

That lack of clarity prompted prosecutors last month reject He is charged with the negligent homicide charge against York and the attempt to negotiate a plea bargain for the remaining crime.

Greene’s death was one of several beatings of black men by Louisiana troopers that prompted the U.S. Department of Justice to open an ongoing investigation. civil rights investigation in the use of force by the state police. But federal prosecutors still not said whether they will file charges in the case after a years-long FBI investigation.

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