Defense Attorney for Ex-Ohio Police Officer Who Fatally Shot Unarmed Black Man After Confusing Keys for Gun Argues Cops Are ‘Allowed to be Mistaken’

Opening statements began Thursday in the murder trial of a former Ohio police officer who fatally shot an unarmed Black man nearly four years ago.Adam Coy faces charges of murder, reckless homicide, and felonious assault in the shooting death of 47-year-old Andre Hill that took place on Dec. 22, 2020, in Columbus, Ohio. The 48-year-old former cop and another officer responded to a non-emergency call made around 1:30 that morning about someone sitting in a vehicle, playing music, and switching the car’s engine on and off.When Coy and his partner arrived at the scene, Coy shot Hill just 10 seconds after Hill emerged from an open garage with only a cellphone in one hand and a set of keys in the other.According to NBC4i, Coy’s defense attorney, Kaitlyn Stephens, stressed in her opening statements that whether the cops found a weapon at the scene is irrelevant because police officers are “allowed to be mistaken.”She asserted that Coy saw a glint of steel in Hill’s hands, which he believed was a revolver but was actually a mass of metal keys. Coy fired out of fear that he was going to be shot. Stephens emphasized that officers are forced to make split-second...