Charlotte-Mecklenburg Police Officer Randall Kerrick will not be retried after the judge in his current case declared a mistrial based on the jury's 8-4 last decision last week in favor of an acquittal, North Carolina state prosecutors said on Friday.
Prosecutors have decided not to retry Kerrick, who shot and killed Jonathan Ferrell, a former football college player, on September 4, 2013. Ferrell, a black man, was unarmed when he was shot.
"In consideration of the jurors' comments, the evidence available to the state, and our background in criminal trials, it is our prosecutors' unanimous belief a retrial will not yield a different result," Senior Deputy Attorney General Robert Montgomery said, according to the Associated Press.
Kerrick was charged with voluntary manslaughter after he killed Ferrell, 24, in a traffic accident. Prosecutors contended that Kerrick should not have used extreme force to mollify Ferrell, who climbed out of his damaged vehicle and went to a nearby house so he could get help.
The woman in the house had called 911 because she thought that someone was breaking inside her house, according to NBC News.
Attorney General Roy Cooper revealed that Ferrell's family and supporters were perturbed with the outcome of the trial, but swore that he would impel law enforcement officers for a more "consistent training" when using deadly force while on duty.
"Officers must be held accountable when they do not follow their training," said Cooper, according to the Charlotte Observer. "Lethal force should be the last option, and training needs to reinforce that."
