The South Carolina police officer charged with shooting and killing Walter Scott on April 4 will not face the death penalty.
According to Reuters, a local prosecutor told the Post and Courier, a South Carolina-based newspaper, that out of the 22 "aggravating circumstances" in the state that let lawyers seek the death penalty, none apply to the incident involving patrolman Michael Slager and Scott.
According to the Post and Courier, Slager, who has already been fired from the police department, faces between 30 years to life in prison if a jury chooses to convict him.
"There are aggravating circumstances which can take a murder case from being a maximum of life to death being the maximum sentence," Scarlett Wilson, Charleston County's chief prosecutor, told the Charleston newspaper. "None of those factors are present in this case."
The Post and Courier added that examples of those "circumstances" include murders during robberies and kidnappings.
The former police officer originally pulled Scott over because he was driving a vehicle with a broken taillight. Upon Slager returning to his patrol car to look up information on the vehicle, Scott fled the scene on foot. The incident culminated in a nearby park, where a passerby was able to capture, on video, the death of Scott. The video shows Slager allegedly firing on Scott with his weapon eight times. The graphic video can be viewed below.
