KANSAS CITY, Mo. — Independence, Missouri, officers who shot and killed a 39-year-old man last year may have mistaken a pill bottle hidden in the victim’s waistband for a pistol, according to Missouri State Highway Patrol investigation transcripts released by the family’s attorney.
The incident has come under scrutiny in recent weeks as video footage of the shooting shared by the attorneys shows Independence police struggling to determine whether Tyrea Pryor, 39, was reaching for a weapon before his death.
Thursday, Jackson County Prosecutor Jean Peters Baker said in a statement that “it was indisputable Pryor did not have a gun in his hand,” but, due to the “reasonable belief” that a threat was being posed to police, the case will not be criminally prosecuted.
Pryor’s family has rallied against the decision. Last week, their attorneys formally requested the U.S. Department of Justice investigate the case.
Independence officers recalled their experience responding to the fatal shooting on March 11, 2022 in interviews with Missouri State Highway Patrol as part of an investigation into the incident.
The interviews with investigators describe Independence Officer Jamie Welsh peeking into the shattered window of the vehicle and warning police that Pryor had a pistol hidden in his waistband.
“It looked like he was pulling back towards his body, and I observed a gun in his hand. His hand was wrapped around the pistol grip,” Welsh said to investigators at Missouri State Highway Patrol.
“I believed it was going to be pointed at me. And at that point in time I yelled, ‘Gun!’”
Officers then fired more then 20 shots into the vehicle, according to a letter to the family explaining Prosecutor Jean Peters Baker’s decision not to prosecute.
Pryor’s legs were “still pinched” in the floorboard area of the driver’s side as bullets flew, the Missouri State Highway Patrol report documented.
Independence Officer Jacob Pope and Officer Welsh then dragged his body into the passenger seat to look for signs of life, but were unable to find any. While Officer Pope did uncover a “bulge” near Pryor’s waistband, it was determined to be a pill bottle and not a hand gun, documents said.
‘The only gun I knew about... was a rifle’
The events leading to the fatal police shooting started just before 8 p.m. on March 11, 2022, when Officer Hunter Soule was called to 803 East College Street on reports of a man and two women pounding on the door of the 911 caller.
In a statement, one of the women said she had gone to the residence to get items back for the other woman. But an argument ensued. As Officer Soule set off his sirens, the man and two women jumped into their white vehicle to flee.
Officer Soule said he witnessed the man, 39-year-old Tyrea Pryor, grab an unknown item from the back of the vehicle before taking off, according to interviews with Missouri State Highway Patrol investigators. By then, Independence Officer Jamie Welsh had also arrived. But the car sped away before they could get a closer look.
Shortly after, the officers witnessed the white vehicle crash into another car at the intersection of 24 Highway and Noland Road.
The pair said they worked quickly to respond to injuries. Two other Independence Officers, Jacob Pope and Alex Steele, arrived and attempted to pull one of the women from the backseat of Pryor’s vehicle to examine her injuries.
Officer Pope also spoke to the woman in the front passenger seat, who had blood running down her face following the car crash. She complained of “chest pains,” Officer Pope said to investigators. He swung her legs outside the vehicle and she fell to the ground, where she lay clutching her face.
Both Officer Soule and Officer Welsh held Pryor at gunpoint, unable to open the driver’s side door due to damage from the crash, according to interviews.
Officer Soule said he repeatedly told Pryor to keep his hands up, but he continued to “dip his hands down and reached down toward his waistband,” according to interviews.
Officers said they also worried that they could not clearly see Pryor’s hands from looking through the driver’s side window since the airbags had been deployed and the window glass was shattered.
Officer Steele climbed into the backseat of the vehicle to asses Pryor’s injuries and determine whether he had a gun.
“You could clearly see that he was stuck in the car because of such heavy damage,” Steele said to Missouri State Highway Patrol investigators.
He later saw that a silver assault rifle was wedged between Pryor’s leg and the vehicle’s center console. When he noticed Pryor’s arm reach for the gun, Steele told Pryor:
“Hey, quit reaching or I’m going to shoot you.”
At that point, he said Pryor stopped reaching for the gun. Officer Steele attempted to remove the firearm from the vehicle, but struggled to pull it from his seat. Then he heard someone say: “He’s reaching again, He’s reaching again.”
Officer Welsh, who was standing in front of the windshield, which had been shattered from the crash, said he believed he saw Pryor pulling a gun from his waistband and yelled “Gun!”
“It happened so quick,” he told investigators. “Basically I’m seeing a black object pistol grip, with a trigger, and then it’s coming up towards the driver’s side window.”
Officer Steele was still in the car as shots were fired. He ducked under the seat and eventually was able to crawl out the back door, according to interviews.
“The only gun that I knew about, at that point, was a rifle,” he told investigators. “I don’t know if he’s got another gun on his lap.”
Pryor was shot about 15 times. Emergency medical personnel declared him dead at the scene. As Officer Pope pulled him from the vehicle, he noticed there was a “bulge in his underwear,” which was determined to be a pill bottle with “baggies of some sort.”
Officer Christopher Walker, who was also at the scene, remembered police saying in the aftermath “ I don’t know if the pistol went somewhere else. I have no clue.”
None of the five officers interviewed reported seeing a handgun in the vehicle after the shooting.
Prosecutor opts against charges
In a press conference last Thursday, the family rallied against the Jackson County Prosecutor’s Office’s decision not to send the case to a grand jury and have the officers potentially be held criminally responsible.
“This is not a case where it’s a close call,” said the family’s attorney Harry Daniels.
“They know they messed up.”
The Jackson County Prosecutor’s Office responded with a letter also sent to the family, explaining that due to the deployed airbags and shattered glass, officers had an obstructed view when monitoring Pryor, but they had reasons to believe he was a threat.
“... The law would not afford the State an opportunity to charge for belief that was later demonstrated to be wrong even if that mistaken belief ended in tragedy as here,” the statement reads.
They maintained the officers are covered under Missouri’s use of force law due to their perception of a threat.
Independence Police Chief Adam Dustman also released a statement regarding the fatal shooting, saying, “The men and women of the Independence Police Department are sworn to keep people safe and when there is a fatality, it weighs heavily on all of us.”
All officer-involved shootings are reviewed by an external agency before being evaluated by the Prosecutor’s Office.
Attempts by the family’s attorney to engage the Department of Justice in an investigation of the shooting are still ongoing.
