A prosecutor has declined to file criminal charges against a Missouri police officer who shot and killed a woman and her infant child last year.

A prosecutor has declined to file criminal charges against a Missouri police officer who shot and killed a woman and her infant child last year.

Independence police officers had responded to a reported assault in November at an apartment building. They were figuring out how to arrest the woman, who was nonverbal and communicating with nods and gestures, when she abruptly grabbed a butcher knife from a bedside table and moved toward the officers while holding the child, Jackson County Prosecutor Melesa Johnson’s office said Friday.

One officer backed away, but the other was against a closet and couldn’t escape, Johnson’s office said. He fired four shots as the woman moved toward him with the knife, the office said. The shots struck and killed the woman and her child, identified by KCUR news as 34-year-old Maria Pike and her 3-month-old daughter, Destinii.

Johnson’s office said the officer’s use of deadly force “falls within the protection of the law.”

Her office also noted there wasn’t enough evidence to conclusively prove the officer intentionally shot the infant.

  • SarcasticMan@lemmy.world
    211·
    25 days ago

    You signed up for a job where you have to make tough maybe life-threatening decisions. You take an oath to serve and protect. You wear a bulletproof vest that is also stab and slash-resistant. You respond to a call, the woman is mental and won’t talk and she is holding an infant. She picks up a knife and advances on you. Do you close the gap and try to disarm her knowing your core vital areas are relatively safe from the knife and she has a child in her other hand? Nope, you might get cut. So, instead, you just smoke her and the kid.