Jun 24, 2016 4 min read

BALTIMORE – Is it ethical for Baltimore’s top prosecutor, who staked her reputation on charging six police officers in the death of Freddie Gray, to keep trying for a conviction? Legal experts said Friday State’s Attorney Marilyn Mosby is obligated to consider this question.

Mosby seemed devastated after the trial judge said he’s seen no evidence a crime was committed when the young black man’s neck was broken in the back of a police van last year.

The acquittal of van driver Caesar Goodson on all counts Thursday was more than just a courtroom setback, given the stakes Mosby raised when she announced the charges shortly after riots shook the city.

Stressing the ethical demands of her office and repeatedly invoking the civil unrest, Mosby vowed then to represent the aggrieved citizens of Baltimore who “experienced injustice at the hands of police officers.”

“To the people of Baltimore and the demonstrators across America: I heard your call for ‘No justice, no peace,” she declared, her voice rising in righteousness and outrage. “You’re at the forefront of this cause and as young people, our time is now.”

Judge Barry Williams also acquitted Officer Edward Nero, who also left Gray face-down in handcuffs and shackles but otherwise unrestrained inside the van’s metal compartment. The two nonjury verdicts, plus another officer’s mistrial, leaves four officers yet to be cleared and prosecutors already feeling defeated.

“I think she understands her ethical obligations,” said University of Baltimore President Kurt Schmoke, who had Mosby’s job in the 1980s before serving as the city’s mayor.

“If I were in her position, I’d take the next couple of days to reevaluate the cases under these new circumstances. If she felt that the rest of the evidence that she has is not as strong as she felt last May, then I would think she would probably conclude that she shouldn’t proceed,” Schmoke said.

Neither Mosby and all others involved are bound by a gag order from commenting.

In court, her prosecutors argued Goodson’s inaction alone proved his intent to do harm.

They said he was criminally negligent because he didn’t restrain the prisoner with a seat belt to keep him safe inside the metal compartment, and didn’t get medical help after Gray repeatedly indicated he needed it.

But the judge said he saw no evidence of individual culpability by Goodson, the only one of the officers to be with Gray the entire time, and to be charged with murder.

Despite the fact the indicted officers were among the last to see Gray healthy – and when they finally pulled him out, his neck felt “like a bag of rocks,” according to one medic’s testimony – Goodson, like Nero, committed no crime, the judge said.

“The failure to seatbelt may have been a mistake or it may have been bad judgment,” Williams said, but “the state has failed to meet its burden to show that the actions of the defendant rose above mere civil negligence.”

In civil court, Gray’s family could have sought compensation under a lower standard of proof for his wrongful death. Instead, the city settled before the young black man’s family went to court, agreeing to pay them $6.4 million. It’s likely that the four officers yet to be cleared will opt for nonjury trials before the same judge. That should weigh heavily as Mosby decides how to proceed, legal experts said.

“The job of a prosecutor isn’t to obtain a conviction at all costs,” said David Weinstein, a defense attorney who spent 10 years as a state prosecutor and another 11 as a federal prosecutor. “It’s right for a prosecutor to strike hard, but they need to be fair.”

“Her decision was to jump quickly into a prosecution of these police officers, and as a result she didn’t have all the evidence in front of her,” Weinstein added. “At this point, having seen what’s now transpired and what the judge’s legal opinion has been, she needs to go back, look at her evidence and all the testimony, she needs to reassess what she’s going to do.”