The case garnered international headlines.
Amber Guyger, a Dallas police officer, was accused of fatally shootingher 26-year-old neighbor, Both Jean, inside his own apartment. Guyger said it was a tragic mistake. She claimed she’d entered the wrong apartment after work and believedJean was an intruderwhen she shot him as he ate ice cream on his sofa.
Ultimately, jurors sided with prosecutors. On Tuesday, they found her guilty of murder.
“I love you as a person and I don’t wish anything bad on you,” he said as he embraced her for nearly a minute, according to theWashington Post.
Tom Fox/AP/Shutterstock
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Others had a different reaction to the hug. Senator Ted Cruz had previously sided with Guyger, saying that many people are “quick to always blame the police officer.” He urged people not to “jump to conclusions” in the case. After the hug, he praised Brandt’s reaction as a demonstration of “Christian love.”
Former U.N. ambassador Nikki Haley tweeted that the hug was “an amazing example of faith, love and forgiveness.”
But others criticized the expectation of forgiveness, saying that while Brandt Jean’s actions were admirable, that sort of reaction should never be expected of victims’ families.
“Black people repeatedly demonstrate an otherworldly beauty in the granting of grace to the undeserving,”tweetedNew York Timescolumnist Charles M. Blow. “But the question remains: where is America’s reciprocity? When are black people, in the wrong and in the vice, granted this grace? When are innocent back people granted this grace?”
As others debate the hug, Botham Jean’s mother says she has more important work to do. In the aftermath of her son’s death, she has become outspoken on the issue of police brutality.
source: people.com
