The Allen County Prosecutor’s Office announced it will not file criminal charges against the officer involved in the shooting that killed Dachena Warren-Hill in November on the city’s southwest side.
Allen County Prosecutor Mike McAlexander said the officer in question was responding to a 911 call that said someone was ramming a vehicle into someone’s house and that when he arrived, he only had seconds to take action.
The Fort Wayne Police Department released the officer’s bodycam video and the audio of the 911 call that both support McAlexander’s take on the incident. In the bodycam video, the officer arrives on the scene and gets out of his patrol vehicle. Less than a minute later, a vehicle reportedly driven by Warren-Hill drives over the grass appearing to be chasing two people on foot. The officer then immediately reports what he sees and opens fire on the vehicle.
McAlexander said the bodycam video was a crucial piece of evidence in the investigation. He said it showed Warren-Hill was driving the vehicle in a dangerous manner.
“He was seeing somebody being chased by a car which, when you use a car like that, a car is a deadly weapon,” McAlexander said.
Because of that, McAlexander came to the conclusion that the officer’s actions were protected under Indiana’s self-defense law, which protects actions taken by someone to keep either themselves or someone else out of danger. From that, McAlexander said the officer could not be held criminally liable.
Community members put up a billboard calling for “justice for Dachena” after the shooting. McAlexander said he wanted those people to know that charging the officer would not be justice.
“There are other avenues for peace through this, but the criminal justice system to charge this officer wouldn’t be appropriate,” McAlexander said.
He went on to say this incident was a “tragedy” but not a crime by the Fort Wayne police officer.