A white Connecticut state trooper charged in
the deadly 2020 shooting of a 19-year-old Black man made his first
appearance in court Tuesday facing a manslaughter charge.
Trooper
Brian North said nothing at his brief arraignment at
Milford Superior Court. Outside the courthouse, family members, their lawyers and Black Lives
Matters groups rallied in support of Mubarak Soulemane, the slain teen.
"I
hope justice will be served to convict Brian North to go to jail. To
convict Brian North for being accountable for killing my son," said Omo Mohammed, Soulemane's mother.
Soulemane's
family says Mubarak suffered from a mental illness.
"I
believe once pictures of the truth – video of what happened is shown to a jury,
they will come to the same conclusion I have that this was an execution," said Sanford Rubenstein, the family's attorney.
North
fired seven shots into the driver's side window of the stolen car driven by
Soulemane after a high-speed chase up I-95 from Norwalk to West Haven. Soulemane was killed.
An
investigation showed Soulemane had a knife but was boxed in by police.
Investigators
say North instructed another trooper to switch from his gun to a Taser in an
effort to use less lethal force to make an arrest. But they say due to
Soulemane’s sudden movements, North was forced to fire his gun to defend other
officers.
"When
our troopers are prosecuted for what we believe to be doing their job, we will
defend them, we will defend their actions when we believe they are justified in
performing their duties to protect the public,” said Andy Matthews, Executive Director of the
Connecticut State Police Union.
North
was arrested two weeks ago and has been placed on leave. He's the first
Connecticut state trooper to be charged with a deadly shooting in over a
decade.
Last
month, Inspector General Robert Devlin says when North fired his gun, neither
he nor any other person was in imminent danger of serious injury or death from
a knife attack at the hands of Soulemane.
North
and his attorney did not comment Tuesday. He is free on bail and due back in court next month.
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