The lawyer for one of two Minneapolis police officers involved in the shooting death of an unarmed Australian woman said Wednesday that they may have feared an ambush.
Justine Damond was killed Saturday night when approaching a police car, after she had placed an emergency call reporting a possible rape taking place near her home in Minnesota.
One of the responding officers, Matthew Harrity, told investigators he had been startled by a loud noise just before the 40-year-old woman approached the car and his partner Mohamed Noor fired the deadly shot, authorities said.
Harrity’s lawyer on Wednesday left open the possibility that the officers had feared an ambush, telling the Minneapolis Star Tribune newspaper that a similar scenario had recently played out in New York.
“It’s certainly reasonable to assume that any police officer would be concerned about a possible ambush under these circumstances,” the newspaper quoted attorney Fred Bruno as saying.
In the New York City incident, a mentally ill man shot and killed officer Miosotis Familia while she was sitting in her vehicle with her partner on July 4.
The Minneapolis officers are both on standard administrative leave, pending the outcome of the probe. Noor has declined to speak with investigators.
As the investigation continued, Minneapolis police released transcripts Wednesday of the two emergency calls Justine Damond made.
“I can hear someone out the back and I, I’m not sure if she’s having sex or being raped,” Damond told the emergency operator, later describing the sounds she was hearing as “distressed.”
Minutes later, the meditation and life coach who had moved to the US to marry her fiance, called back to check if police were coming. The operator assured her that they were.
Harrity and Noor responded to the call with their emergency lights off. After Damond approached their squad car on the driver’s side, reportedly still in her pajamas, Noor shot her from the passenger’s seat.
She died at the scene of a gunshot wound to the abdomen, authorities said.
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