THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
JANUARY 11, 2014
Photo courtesy rt.com
DURHAM, N.C. — Police in North Carolina say all evidence collected during their investigation into the shooting death of a handcuffed teenager indicates he killed himself with a concealed large-caliber pistol that a rookie officer failed to detect when he frisked him.
Durham police on Friday presented preliminary findings of an internal investigation into the shooting death of 17-year-old Jesus Huerta, who died Nov. 19 in the back of a squad car as it was pulling into the parking lot at police headquarters.
A medical examiner’s report released separately on Friday said Huerta died from a close-range gunshot to the face.
Huerta had been arrested by Officer Samuel Duncan shortly before he died on an outstanding warrant for misdemeanor trespassing after a family member called 911 and asked for help after the teen walked out of his home following a late-night argument.
“The evidence and information collected thus far indicate that Mr. Huerta had a handgun concealed on his person,” said Capt. L.J. Clayton, who oversaw the department’s internal affairs investigation. “Officer Duncan did not discover this handgun during his search of Mr. Huerta. Mr. Huerta shot himself with that handgun.”
The Durham Police report on the shooting is separate from an ongoing review by the State Bureau of Investigation, the findings of which have not yet been made public.
Huerta’s death in police custody has rocked this Southern city. Racial tensions here can be quick to boil to the surface and mistrust of law enforcement runs deep in many minority neighborhoods, even though the city’s police chief is Latino and the long-serving mayor is black.
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