Updates to our Terms of Use

We are updating our Terms of Use. Please carefully review the updated Terms before proceeding to our website.

Thursday, March 28, 2024 | Back issues
Courthouse News Service Courthouse News Service

White Police Officer Kills|Black Teen Near Dallas

DALLAS (CN) - A white, rookie police officer shot an unarmed black teenager to death Friday at a suburban Dallas car dealership.

Christian Taylor, 19, of Mansfield, was shot repeatedly at the Classic GMC Buick dealership in Arlington early Friday morning. Police said the shooter, Officer Brad Miller, 49, fired four shorts - the first times he fired his service weapon in the line of duty. He was placed on administrative leave pending an internal investigation.

Miller recently graduated from the police academy and was serving the 16 weeks of field training required of new officers. The unidentified training officer who was with him is a 19-year police veteran and fired his Taser, police said.

Arlington Police Chief Will Johnson asked the Dallas field office of the FBI to assist in the investigation for transparency, but he expressed "full confidence" in his department's "vigorously thorough" investigation.

He acknowledged the national spotlight on the case is "not in isolation," due to "social injustice, inequities, racism and police misconduct" in other communities.

The fatal shooting came two days before the first anniversary of the police killing of Michael Brown in Ferguson, Mo., where gunshots from protesters and police were fired Sunday.

"The decision to use deadly force is one of the most difficult and most scrutinized decisions an officer can make," Johnson said at a news conference Saturday. "It represents the ultimate use of police authority and should be used at a last resort to protect the life of another or the life of a police officer. Because a police officer's primary mission is the preservation of life, the decision to use deadly force is innately contrary to the goals to preserve the peace and to safeguard life and property."

Johnson said police were called to the dealership at 1:05 a.m. The car dealer released surveillance video on Sunday that shows a black man driving up to the closed showroom in a Jeep, then calmly walking up to several cars and jumping up and down on them. He kicks in the windshield of a Ford Mustang, then drives his Jeep through the glass exterior of the showroom. Police cruisers and an ambulance arrive in the parking lot minutes later.

Johnson said responding officers ordered Taylor to the ground.

"As officers stood outside the building, they made verbal contact with Mr. Taylor through the glass wall, instructing him to lie on the ground," the police chief said. "Mr. Taylor was not compliant."

An "altercation" occurred inside the building when Miller and the second officer caught up to Taylor, but Johnson declined to elaborate on what happened.

A sophomore football player at Angelo State University, Taylor's posts on Twitter about racism and police tactics have gone viral since his death.

"Police taking black lives as easy as flippin a coin, with no consequences smh," he posted on Dec. 24, 2014. (Smh probably indicates: Shake my head.)

On July 30 this year, he posted: "I don't wanna die too younggggg."

At a Saturday vigil, Taylor's family said he was a model brother. They questioned whether deadly force was necessary and said Taylor was just a child.

Adrian Taylor said people will make mistakes, and learn from them.

"He didn't get a chance to learn," he said. "His life is over."

Joshua Taylor said he could "ask for nothing more" in a brother.

"Joshua did everything he was asked to do, he took care of his business," he said. "He definitely [was] on the right path and was getting his life together."

Classic GMC Buick said on Saturday that its security company told Taylor to leave the lot and that police were coming.

"The death of a young man at the dealership is a tragedy for all people involved," the Buick dealer said in a statement. "The dealership would never want a person hurt on the premises, and use the video to discourage thefts."

Follow @davejourno
Categories / Uncategorized

Subscribe to Closing Arguments

Sign up for new weekly newsletter Closing Arguments to get the latest about ongoing trials, major litigation and hot cases and rulings in courthouses around the U.S. and the world.

Loading...