Police Brutality / Individual record
Oscar Grant
Oscar Grant III, 22, was shot in the back by a BART police officer while lying face down on an Oakland train platform on New Year's Day 2009.
- Record ID
- PB-035
- Incident date
- January 1, 2009
- Date of death
- January 1, 2009
- Outcome
- Fatal
- Location
- Oakland, CA
- Category
- Police shooting
What happened
Shortly after 2 a.m. on January 1, 2009 BART police responded to reports of a fight on a train at Fruitvale Station. Officers detained several riders including Oscar Grant III. Bystander recordings showed Grant on the platform as officers attempted to arrest and handcuff him. Officer Johannes Mehserle shot Grant in the back with his handgun while Grant was unarmed and face down. Mehserle argued that he had intended to draw his Taser but mistakenly pulled the handgun. Grant's killing and the recordings of it galvanized his family, civil-rights advocates and large protests demanding justice for police violence. His mother and loved ones continued speaking publicly about the loss.
Investigation & findings
In 2010 a jury convicted Mehserle of involuntary manslaughter but acquitted him on more serious charges. California's Court of Appeal summarized the evidence and the officer's Taser-defense claim in its published decision.
Source record details
- Source incident ID
- Historical source-derived record, pre-2015
Sources & records
- Primary source
- Additional source
- Methodology and national police killings trackingMapping Police Violence · Dataset/methodology
- Published historical compilation of Black people killed in police custody (1999–2014)SAGE journal / cited NAACP LDF memorial listing · 2016 · Secondary scholarly source