Family of NYC man killed by police seeks answers

NEW YORK - Stunned relatives of an unarmed man killed by a rookie police officer in a dark public housing stairwell looked on as the Rev. Al Sharpton and public officials demanded a full investigation Saturday into what law enforcement officials have termed an apparent accident.

"We're not demonizing the police," Sharpton said, but "this young man should not be dead."

Police said the shooting Thursday night of Akai Gurley in Brooklyn appears accidental. But "how do we know until there is a thorough investigation of all that happened?" Sharpton asked.

He spoke at a rally in Harlem, standing alongside Gurley's 2-year-old daughter, her mother, and several elected officials.

Gurley's death comes at a sensitive time, with a grand jury weighing whether to bring criminal charges against another officer in the chokehold death of a man on Staten Island, and the nation bracing for an announcement on whether an indictment will be returned in the police shooting of an unarmed 18-year-old in Ferguson, Mo.

City police often conduct "vertical patrols" inside public housing by going from roofs down staircases that sometimes are havens for crime. Police Commissioner William Bratton has said the patrols are needed, and the development where Gurley was shot had recently seen a shooting, robberies, and assaults.

Officer Peter Liang and his partner, also new to the force, were patrolling a pitch-dark stairwell with flashlights late Thursday, police said. Gurley, 28, was leaving his girlfriend's apartment after she had braided his hair, according to the girlfriend, who is not his daughter's mother.

Police said the officers walked down the stairs onto an eighth-floor landing when Gurley and his girlfriend opened a stairwell door one floor down, after giving up on waiting for an elevator. Police said Liang, patrolling with his gun drawn, fired without a word and apparently by accident, hitting Gurley from about 10 feet away.

Bratton said officers generally have discretion on whether to draw their weapons based on what they are encountering or believe they may encounter. He called Gurley's death a tragedy that befell someone "totally innocent."

Liang, 26, has been placed on modified duty. Under standard policy, internal affairs investigators won't be able to question him until prosecutors have decided whether to file criminal charges.