Grand jury may indict officer in shooting of student

WILMINGTON -- A New Hanover County grand jury is considering whether former sheriff’s deputy Christopher Long broke the law when he shot and killed a college student from Durham.

After nearly two hours of hearing evidence, the grand jury was unable to finish their deliberations Monday. They will resume tomorrow morning.

Monday afternoon they heard from a State Bureau of Investigation agent who presented evidence on behalf of the state Attorney General’s Office to support a manslaughter charge against Long in the death of Peyton Strickland. Another agent will testify tomorrow.

They also heard from Long, and will hear more from him tomorrow.

On Dec. 1, heavily armed deputies were storming Strickland’s rental home in Wilmington to search for a stolen Playstation 3 video machine.

Long, a 10-year veteran of the New Hanover Sheriff’s Office, fired at the house after he mistook the sound of a battering ram at the door for gun blasts, a prosecutor said in December. Long was so close to Strickland when he fired his submachine gun through the closed door that gunpowder peppered the teenager’s chest, a medical examiner found.

If the grand jury chooses to charge Long with a crime, he will be the first law enforcement officer in recent years to face criminal repercussions for killing in the line of duty. A News & Observer analysis of fatal police shootings in North Carolina from 2000 through 2006 found that prosecutors and grand juries found all 100 fatal police shootings to be legally justified.

Attempts to indict Long have ignited outrage among law enforcement officers, who argue that officers ought to be shielded from criminal charges when making split-second decisions in the line of duty.

Long’s case has been plagued by blunders since December. A grand jury that heard evidence against Long then erroneously reported to a clerk that it had voted to indict Long on a charge of second-degree murder. Long was arrested, only to be released the next day.

New Hanover County District Attorney Ben David and a local judge removed themselves from the case in February. David handed the case to special prosecutors at the state Attorney General’s Office after concluding citizens would second-guess any decision he made in the case.

Special prosecutors started from scratch in February and decided to bring evidence before a grand jury today. The SBI investigated the case.

Richmond County Superior Court Judge Michael Beale was assigned to hear the matter today. At the request of Long’s lawyers, Beale this morning ruled in favor of allowing grand jurors to question Long.

Long lost his job days after the shooting and has lived in a sort of exile since, unable to live in his home and find steady work, family friends and his attorney have said.