MADISON, Wis. (AP) — Two court-appointed prosecutors declined Wednesday to cost a Wisconsin sheriff’s deputy within the 2016 deadly taking pictures of a person sleeping in a park.

The choice validates a district legal professional’s discovering years in the past that Joseph Mensah had acted in self-defense when he shot Jay Anderson Jr., certainly one of three folks he fatally shot over a five-year span.

Mensah was a Wauwatosa police officer on the time however has since turn into a Waukesha County deputy.

The particular prosecutors, Milwaukee legal professional Scott Hansen and La Crosse County District Legal professional Tim Gruenke, mentioned they couldn’t discover any authorized foundation for charging Mensah.

Mensah stumbled on Anderson, who was 25, sleeping in a automobile after hours in a Wauwatosa park in June 2016. Mensah mentioned he fired after Anderson reached for a gun on the passenger seat, and Milwaukee County District Legal professional John Chisholm declined to cost Mensah later that yr. Chisholm additionally selected to not cost Mensah within the deaths of both of the opposite two folks he killed.

Anderson’s household disputed that Anderson had reached for the gun and their legal professional used a obscure authorized maneuver much like a grand jury inquiry to steer Milwaukee County Circuit Decide Glenn Yamahiro that there was sufficient possible trigger to help charging Mensah. I n December, he appointed Hansen and Gruenke as particular prosecutors to evaluation the case and file costs in the event that they noticed match.

Mensah joined the Wauwatosa Police Division in 2015. That yr, he fatally shot Antonio Gonzales, who prosecutors mentioned had refused to drop a sword. Mensah killed Anderson the next yr. In 2020, he shot and killed 17-year-old Alvin Cole as Cole fled from police following a disturbance at a mall. Mensah mentioned he fired as a result of Cole pointed a gun at him. That taking pictures sparked months of protests.

In explaining his rationale for not charging Mensah in Cole’s dying, Chisholm mentioned proof confirmed, amongst different issues, that Cole fled from police carrying a stolen handgun, fired a shot whereas fleeing and refused police instructions to drop the weapon.

Mensah is Black, as had been Anderson and Cole. Gonzales recognized as Native American.

Mensah resigned underneath strain from the Wauwatosa Police Division in 2020 and joined the Waukesha County Sheriff’s Division.