A Colorado paramedic convicted within the 2019 loss of life of Elijah McClain, a younger Black man whose case helped drive the nationwide police reform motion, was sentenced on Friday to 5 years in jail.
The case was a uncommon legal prosecution of emergency medical personnel, and stirred outrage amongst paramedics and firefighters throughout the nation who fear that pressing choices made as a part of their jobs may be criminalized.
The paramedic, Peter Cichuniec, 51, a former lieutenant with Aurora Fireplace Rescue, was convicted in December of criminally negligent murder and second-degree assault for the illegal administration of medication. He was one in all 5 cops and paramedics prosecuted in state district court docket over three consecutive trials.
A second paramedic and a police officer have been additionally convicted. In January, Randy Roedema, 41, a lieutenant within the Aurora Police Division officer on the time, was sentenced to 14 months in a county jail. Jeremy Cooper, the paramedic working with Mr. Cichuniec, is scheduled to be sentenced in April.
In a courtroom full of Mr. Cichuniec’s household and dozens of firefighters from throughout the nation, District Decide Mark Douglas Warner mentioned he took many variables into consideration, together with reward for Mr. Cichuniec’s character from those that knew him, weighed in opposition to the “loss of life of a younger man who is solely strolling house from a comfort retailer.”
Throughout greater than an hour of character statements, relations, pals and colleagues testified that Mr. Cichuniec was a compassionate man and expert chief with a “servant’s coronary heart” who was emotionally wrecked by the loss of life of Mr. McClain.
Handcuffed and sporting his striped inmate’s uniform, Mr. Cichuniec started his request for leniency by saying he had taken an oath 18 years in the past to place different individuals’s lives earlier than his personal. “I want I may look Ms. McClain within the eye and inform her that Elijah can be OK,” he mentioned, including his the younger man’s loss of life destroyed him as an individual, a father and a guardian. “I’m sorry that Elijah McClain is not with us.”
The choose additionally heard an impassioned assertion from Mr. McClain’s mom, Sheneen McClain, who mentioned her son’s loss of life was not a horrible tragedy however an avoidable homicide. She described as soon as eager to grow to be a firefighter herself and considered them as “native heroes” till “I watched them homicide my son,” she mentioned.
She mentioned the paramedics “didn’t save him” and “felt no must cease the brutality.”
Ms. McClain emerged from the courthouse together with her fist raised, and mentioned she had no additional remark.
Mr. Cichuniec was dealing with as much as 16 years in jail, and the sentence he acquired was probably the most lenient based mostly on obligatory sentencing pointers. The judged added one other yr on a separate cost, to be served concurrently the five-year sentence.
The convictions of the 2 paramedics shook the world of emergency staff who’ve usually been shielded from legal prosecution — and it pressured questions concerning the dynamic between the police and paramedics at a scene.