MIAMI — A Florida appeals court has overturned the conviction of a former North Miami police officer who was convicted for shooting at an autistic man holding a silver toy truck, a case that drew national headlines.
The Third District Court of Appeals on Wednesday overturned the misdemeanor culpable negligence conviction for Jonathon Aledda, who claimed he believed the man was holding a firearm and holding another man hostage during a standoff in July 2016.
The Miami-Dade State Attorney’s Office must now decide if it will re-try Aledda, who was fired from the police department after the shooting.
Aledda fired three times at Arnaldo Rios Soto, but hit and wounded Charles Kinsey, an unarmed behavioral therapist who was laying on the ground with his hands in the air, begging police not to shoot. Video of the incident went viral at a time when the national was grappling with high-profile cases of death caused by police officers.
At his trial in June 2019, Aledda testified that he believed Soto had a gun and was holding Kinsey hostage in the middle of a North Miami street. A motorist had called 911 to report a man she believed might be holding a gun to his head.
Prosecutors argued that Aledda fired in haste, ignoring a radio dispatch from another cop who had determined the toy was no weapon. The jury acquitted him of two felony counts of attempted manslaughter but convicted on the misdemeanor. A Miami judge sentenced him to probation, and granted him a “withhold of adjudication,” meaning no conviction appeared on his record.
The appeals court, however, ruled that the conviction was tainted because the court refused to allow the testimony a Aledda’s SWAT commander, to testify about the special training he’d received on dealing with hostage rescues.
In Lozano’s case, the court ruled, “the training undertaken by the professional would be relevant for the jury to consider in determining how and why the professional assessed and responded to the situation,” and whether his “response was objectively reasonable.”
In seeking to not allow the SWAT commander’s testimony, prosecutors had cited the case of former Miami police officer William Lozano, who was convicted of manslaughter for the 1989 shooting that left two men dead. An appeal courts overturned the conviction, saying the state wrongfully introduced manuals that showed he’s violated departmental policies.
But in Aledda’s case, the court ruled, the testimony about Aledda’s SWAT training was key.
“He offered the testimony to show how he was trained to react to the precise situation with which he was confronted. Thus, the introduction of [the commander’s] testimony regarding Aledda’s training would assist – rather than confuse – the jury in determining whether Aledda’s response to the circumstances he encountered was criminally negligent.”
