A Colorado jury on Friday found two Aurora paramedics guilty of criminally negligent homicide in the death of 23-year-old Elijah McClain, who died of an overdose of ketamine administered by the medics in 2019.
Peter Cichuniec, who injected McClain with the drug, was also found guilty of second degree assault by drugging but was acquitted of another assault charge, the Denver Post reports. Jeremy Cooper was acquitted of both assault counts.
The two face the possibility of years in prison at sentencing.
In August 2019, Aurora police officers responding to a suspicious person call detained McClain, 23, as he walked home from a corner store, as CrimeOnline reported. During the 20-minute ordeal, officers put McClain in a carotid hold and violently restrained him with an armbar and their knees, a federal lawsuit alleged.
“Let go of me. I am an introvert. Please respect the boundaries that I am speaking,” McClain was heard saying in police’s bodycam footage.
While McClain was handcuffed, Cichuniec injected him with 500mg of ketamine.
McClain, who went into cardiac arrest during the encounter, died days after being declared brain dead. McClain’s autopsy was inconclusive, but a federal lawsuit stated that “intense physical exertion and a narrow left coronary artery contributed to [his] death.”
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In 2021, the city of Aurora agreed to pay McClain’s family $15 million. The multimillion-dollar settlement came months after a city’s independent report found wrongdoing in police officers’ stop and arrest of McClain.
In October, jurors reached a split verdict for two Aurora police officers involved in the case. Randy Roedema was found guilty of criminally negligent homicide and third degree assaul, while Jason Rosenblatt was acquitted on charges of reckless manslaughter and second-degree assault.
And in November, a jury acquitted Nathan Woodyard, the officer who carried out the carotid hold. He has returned to work at the department.
McClain’s mother, Sheneen McClain was unsatisfied with the October and November results but raised a fist in the air on Friday as she left the courtroom, the Post said.
“We knew these cases would be difficult to prosecute,” Colorado Attorney General Phil Weiser said in a statement Friday evening. “We are satisfied with today’s verdict, and we are confident that bringing these cases to trial was the right thing to do for justice, for Elijah McClain, and for healing in the Aurora community. … The world — Elijah and especially his mother Sheneen McClain — deserved to have the full story told. And justice demanded it.”
Cichuniec, who was also convicted on a sentence enhancer for causing serious bodily injury or death, was taken into custody immediately after the trial. Cooper remained free on bond.
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