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Police Will Face No Charges In 2011 Memorial Day Shooting On Miami Beach

YOUTUBE USER SHAWN DON

  Prosecutors will not charge the police officers who killed a motorist on South Beach in a hail of bullets after a chaotic chase during Memorial Day weekend four years ago.

In a long-awaited ruling on the controversial incident, the Miami-Dade state attorney’s office officially ruled Tuesday that the 12 officers were “legally justified” in killing Raymond Herisse after he plowed into several cars and nearly ran over several bicycle cops. Police bullets — over 100 were fired in all — also wounded four bystanders.

Though opening fire on a Collins Avenue teeming with a holiday crowd might not have been a safe choice, prosecutors decided that under Florida’s “fleeing felon” law, the officers acted lawfully in trying to keep Herisse from hurting anyone.

“This was not a routine stop of an individual who had committed a traffic violation,” prosecutors wrote in an 87-page final memo detailing a May 30, 2011, shooting that drew national attention. “The surrounding officers obviously and correctly viewed this as a dangerous and potentially desperate suspect.”

Read more at MiamiHerald.com.

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