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Christian Hall, 19, who had been suffering from a mental health emergency at the time, was standing near the ledge of a highway overpass in Hamilton Township on Dec. 30, 2020, armed with what appeared to be a real gun when police arrived.
It turned out to be a BB gun.
State police initially claimed that troopers fired their weapons in response to Hall pointing a gun at them, but unredacted footage obtained by civil rights attorney Ben Crump and multiple news outlets captured Hall's final moments.
In the new footage, Hall is seen with his hands above his head, pointing the gun away from police for about 14 seconds before he is fatally shot, USA Today reports.
The original 30-minute video, released in March by the Monroe County District Attorney's Office, shows Hall raising his hands in the air, pellet gun in one hand, after a trooper fires shots that miss him and strike the bridge.
Authorities, however, blurred the final seconds of the video just before his death.
Ben Crump, the attorney representing Hall's family, said his legal team had to "push relentlessly for nearly a year to obtain the unredacted video of Hall's killing."
"Pennsylvania State Police tried to sell one version of events in which Christian was advancing toward them and pointing the supposed gun at them – but now we, and the whole world, know that Christian did not advance toward officers and in fact had his arms raised in the universal position of surrender when he was shot repeatedly and unnecessarily," Crump said in a statement.
"Parents whose children are in the midst of a mental health emergency should be confident that their children will be assisted by law enforcement, not gunned down when they need help the most," he added.
The Monroe County District Attorney's Office determined in March that the troopers' use of deadly force was justified and that no charges would be filed, citing that the troopers' lives were in danger and Hall had a "desire to end his life."
This halted Pennsylvania Attorney General Josh Shapiro’s ability to launch an external investigation, as it requires a referral from the DA's office to do so.
"This cover-up of the facts speaks directly to the importance of transparency when investigating excessive force incidents and highlights the need for investigations that are fully independent of the office involved," Crump said.
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