Police Brutality / Individual record
Christian James Taylor
The Washington Post's Fatal Force database records Christian James Taylor in a fatal on-duty police shooting on 2015-08-07 in Arlington, TX. Individual circumstances and legal outcome require case-specific review.
- Record ID
- PB-231
- Incident date
- August 7, 2015
- Outcome
- Fatal
- Location
- Arlington, TX
- Agency
- Arlington Police Department
- Category
- Fatal on-duty police shooting
- Age (reported)
- 19
What happened
Christian James Taylor, 19, an unarmed college football player, was shot and killed by Arlington, Texas, police officer Brad Miller inside an automobile dealership on August 7, 2015. Surveillance footage showed Taylor damaging vehicles and entering the building before officers arrived. Miller, a probationary officer, went into the showroom without coordinating with his training officer and shot Taylor. Police Chief Will Johnson fired Miller, saying his tactical judgment created cascading dangers and a preventable confrontation. A grand jury declined to indict Miller. In 2017 Arlington agreed to pay Taylor's family $850,000 to settle civil claims. The payment was a civil settlement, not a criminal conviction; the administrative finding that Miller acted improperly is separately documented.
Investigation & findings
Individual legal and investigative outcome not yet reviewed.
Washington Post Fatal Force v2; 2015–2024
Source record details
- Source incident ID
- 711
- Race code in source
- B
- Race source method
- not_available
- Gender (source)
- male
- Armed status (source)
- unarmed
- Flee status (source)
- not
- Agency IDs (source)
- 698
Sources & records
- Primary source
- Additional source
- Methodology and national police killings trackingMapping Police Violence · Dataset/methodology
- Fatal Force v2 — fatal on-duty police shootings, 2015–2024The Washington Post · Dataset