Samayoa faces charges of voluntary manslaughter, involuntary manslaughter, assault with a semiautomatic weapon, assault by a police officer and discharge of a firearm with gross negligence, the district attorney’s office said Monday.
Boudin, a liberal former public defender, was elected last year on a platform of criminal justice reform and promised a tougher stance on law enforcement accountability.
“I hope the message people take from this decision is my commitment to follow through on my campaign promises, the recognition that no one is above the law, not even police officers, and that we value the Black and Brown lives impacted by police violence,” Boudin told The Washington Post on Tuesday.
“We recognize that the vast majority of the police officers are doing the job well, but when an officer violates the law, there will be consequences,” he added.
The charges come amid mounting public demands nationally for greater accountability in cases of alleged police abuse and in police killings.
Boudin argued that cases such as the police killings of George Floyd in Minneapolis and Breonna Taylor in Louisville, cases that sparked protests across the country, reflected “the failures of our legal system to hold police accountable for the violence committed against the very members of the public they are entrusted to keep safe,” he said.
“This lack of accountability for police who abuse their power has created great mistrust, particularly for communities of color,” he said.
On Dec. 1, 2017, Officers Edric Talusan and Samayoa followed a person thought to have carjacked a state lottery van in the residential neighborhood of Potrero Hill.
When the van reached a dead-end street and other police cars blocked its path, O’Neil, 42, jumped out of the car and ran past the police car where Samayoa was seated in the passenger seat.
Samayoa, who was just out of the police academy and four days into his field training, fired his gun through the side window, killing O’Neil.
Samayoa’s body camera showed that O’Neil did not have a weapon, and O’Neil’s manner of death was determined to be a homicide, according to the district attorney’s office.
In March 2018, the officer was fired from the SFPD as a result of the shooting, prompting outrage from the police union, which argued that Samayoa’s firing was unfair given the fact that he was doing, the union argued, what he was trained to do, the San Francisco Chronicle reported.
Historically, district attorneys have rarely brought homicide cases against law enforcement officers. Boudin attributes this in part to structural problems in the criminal justice system as well as a lack of political will.
“The law and local politics often privilege police officers, even those who unlawfully use lethal force, above average people, and it is unfortunate that this decision is unprecedented, because we should be holding ourselves to a higher standard, and we should be enforcing the laws equally,” Boudin told The Post.
His decision to prosecute, Boudin said, represents a commitment to a “different course that will hold officers accountable when they break the law and will value the lives hurt by unwarranted police use of force.”
Although the killing took place before Boudin took office in January, it is among several high-profile cases of slayings by police officers that his office is reviewing. O’Neil’s death, which prompted outrage in San Francisco three years ago, is considered by some law experts as a test case for the liberal district attorney’s vow to hold police officers more accountable.
The DA’s office filed an arrest warrant for Samayoa on Saturday, and he is expected to surrender this week. An arraignment is scheduled for Dec. 28, Boudin said.
Through the district attorney’s office, San Francisco Board of Supervisors member Shamann Walton praised the decision to prosecute.
“This prosecution is an important, historic step towards showing that Black lives matter and that unlawful police violence will not be tolerated,” he said.