Texas Cop Who Killed Jordan Edwards Charged With Murder
Dallas County district attorney on Roy Oliver: He is “very, very likely a danger to the community.”
On April 29, then-officer Roy Oliver shot and killed unarmed 15-year-old Jordan Edwards. Yesterday (July 17), Oliver (37), who was formerly employed by the Balch Springs (Texas) Police Department, was indicted for that fatal shooting.
The Dallas Morning News reports that a Dallas County grand jury indicted Oliver, who is White, on a murder charge as well as four counts of aggravated assault by a public servant for shooting in a car that held five teenagers.
As Colorlines previously reported following the shooting:
On April 29, 15-year-old Jordan Edwards attended a house party in Balch Springs, a Dallas, Texas, suburb. After hearing gunshots, he and four other teens headed to their car. Moments later, a still unnamed officer with the Balch Springs Police Department shot through a passenger side window and shot the unarmed Black teen in the head. He was pronounced dead at a local hospital.
The police department issued a statement via Facebook the next day, saying that officers were responding to a 911 call about drunk underage kids. The statement says the cops heard gunshots, then engaged in an “unknown altercation with a vehicle backing down the street towards the officers in an aggressive manner.”