A suburban Chicago police officer accused of acting recklessly by fatally shooting a 95-year-old World War II veteran with a beanbag gun at close range has been acquitted.
BACK STORY:
43-year-old, Craig Taylor was one of several officers who were dispatched to the assisted living facility where Wrana lived on July 26, 2013, after a staff member reported that Wrana had become combative with emergency workers trying to care for him.
According to court documents, when the officers entered his room they saw Wrana holding a long metal object that officers believed was a knife or machete, but was actually a shoe horn. Wrana did pick up a knife and threaten the officers with it, and he refused their orders to drop it.
One of the officers fired a stun gun at Wrana but missed. Then when Wrana, still holding the knife, moved toward him, Taylor fired the beanbag gun at him, then paused before firing four more times, according to prosecutors.
All of the shots were fired from no more than 8 feet away, according to prosecutors, who have said the “optimum distance” of 15 to 60 feet is spelled out in training standards.
