Charges being reviewed in fatal police shooting of Ohio teen Ma’Khia Bryant
The case of the fatal shooting of Ohio teen Ma’Khia Bryant by Columbus police earlier this year has been sent to the country prosecutor for review.
The Ohio Bureau of Criminal Investigation’s completed review of the 16-year-old’s shooting by Columbus Police Officer Nicholas Reardon has been referred to Franklin County Prosecutor G. Gary Tyack, the office of Ohio Attorney General Dave Yost announced Wednesday morning, reported The Columbus Dispatch.
Ma’Khia was killed on April 20 in the shooting that occurred shortly before ex-Minneapolis cop Derek Chauvin was convicted in the 2020 murder of George Floyd.
The BCI also referred the case of Andrew Teague’s fatal shooting to prosecutors, according to the outlet.
Teague, 43, was killed in early March during a shootout with Columbus Police Officer John Kifer and Franklin County sheriff’s deputy Michael Severance, the agencies said in March, according to the newspaper. The agencies said Teague was suspected of felonious assault and that a pursuit for him was called off when he drove the wrong way on the freeway, the outlet reports.
Both cases, said Yost, were sent to the prosecutor’s office, where they will be reviewed for potential charges, Tuesday and the reviews of charges will likely take weeks if not longer to be completed, according to the paper.
The announcement was in part to promote transparency, “one of the most important values of our office,” said Yost, according to the outlet.
Ma’Khia was shot after cops arrived to a foster home where she and a sibling had been staying, to see her holding a knife. Friends and witnesses said she was acting in self-defense against others at the residence.
Ma’Khia died at a nearby hospital that day and Yost’s office said it had processed the crime scene as well as interviewed 15 civilian witnesses and a trio of law enforcement officers, according to the outlet.
Teague’s 18-year-old son, Saadiq Teague, was arrested in April in a Midtown Manhattan subway with an AK-47 in tow, which his mother told the Daily News spoke nothing of ill intent.
The younger Teague “was misinformed of the gun laws in NY,” his mother messaged The News at the time. “He was visiting Times Square for the first time to see it in person. He was so excited and had no other reasons for being in NY!”
Yost on Wednesday also said his office is investigating the fatal shooting of Miles Jackson, 27, during an exchange of gunfire with officers in mid-April, according to The Columbus Dispatch. That probe is nearly done.
