A federal judge has dismissed a civil rights lawsuit filed by the parents of an environmental activist who was shot dead by Georgia state troopers, saying their actions were “objectively reasonable” when they shot pepper balls into the activist's tent and ultimately fired fatal gunshots after the 26-year-old shot one of the troopers.
The Jan. 18, 2023, shooting of Manuel Paez Terán, known as “Tortuguita,” was a galvanizing moment for the movement to halt the construction of what critics labeled “Cop City,” a sprawling police and firefighter training center that opened last year on the site of a forest and former prison farm just outside Atlanta.
