Father shoots daughter - no trial?

[Namingbaba]

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cvg1ex3w91no

Isn’t this crazy? I don’t understand how it isn’t even going to trial. She had no interest in guns. They’d argued about politics. It’s so depressing. I wonder if her being British and anti-Trump were factors in there being no trial.

All does seem very strange.

From evidence at the inquest it sounds like the specific thing they were arguing about was Trump sexually assaulting a woman.

Dad shot daughter after 'arguing about Donald Trump'
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cwyk917xy8no
[...] Littler said on the morning of 10 January his partner had asked her father during the Trump row: "How would you feel if I was the girl in that situation and I'd been sexually assaulted?"

Kris Harrison had replied that he had two other daughters who lived with him so it would not upset him that much.

Littler said Lucy became "quite upset" and ran upstairs.

This is insane.

Is he just... walking about scot-free?

Of course it’s going to trial. It’s first degree murder.

Awful

It says in the article no criminal case will be brought and a grand jury declined to indict him?

Try reading the news article?

No it's not going to trial.
Madness.

Jesus. First he tells her he wouldn't care if she was sexually assaulted then he murders her. And he gets away with it with some story that is clearly bullshit.

IIUC from those two articles, first there was a US police investigation into Lucy Harrison's death looking at possible manslaighter by her father, Kris Harrison.

Then a grand jury session was held in Collin County, Texas, USA where the grand jury "determined there was insufficient evidence to charge anyone in connection with Lucy Harrison's death."

Now there has been an inquest in Warrington, in the UK, where Lucy Harrison lived. The British coroner has found "Lucy Harrison died due to unlawful killing on the grounds of gross negligence manslaughter."

Both Kris Harrison and Lucy's mother Jane Coates had legal representatives at the Warrington inquest. Kris' lawyer tried to get the British coroner to recuse herself, claiming possible appearance of bias (no mention in the article of what this might be), but coroner refused to recuse.

IANAL, but unless the US justice system (perhaps specifically Texas justice system) now acts on the UK coroner's finding, then yes it does look like he's going to continue walking around scot-free.

He's a gun toting,Trump supporting man.

Lucy Harrison was just a woman and a foreign one at that.

Welcome to Trump's America.

And also it's Texas. Of course the guy is going to get away with it.

The US is absolutely fucked as a country.

I only heard about this yesterday and could not believe what I was listening to. No charges against him WTF!
I think it’s been reported today that a coroner (in the UK) has ruled unlawful killing. however that piece of shit will still be free over in the states.
It’s too sad to comprehend.

I felt the same confusion reading this. America is bonkers. Poor girl.

Any idea if dad is a US citizen? Could the family do a private prosecution in US?

I couldn’t believe it when I read it this morning. I feel so sorry for the rest of Lucy’s family, especially her Mum and partner.

I sincerely hope that he is not living with his wife and Lucy’s half sisters now.

He got drunk, argued with and then killed his daughter. He should be locked up.

All you did was rudely and sarcastically respond to my post instead of the OP, which I found bullying. Be better.

i asked you a question. Which was neither rude nor sarcastic. It was a question.

Your post however was rude and has been taken down. Funny that!

this is just insane-does heknow high up pople-he cant just get away with this

IIUC he didn't shoot her during the argument, but later the same day.

He claimed it was an accident. He had been drinking.

He led his daughter into his bedroom, and his story is he got out his gun to show her and "as I picked it up it just went off".

So for the American grand jury it's possible it was just an everyday lethal domestic accident.

It does seems strange they didn't indict and send it to trial to decide though.

The statistics are that in federal cases grand juries indict 99.9% of the time. There may be some variation with state grand juries, but nonetheless there's apparently a saying in US law that grand juries will “indict a ham sandwich.”

https://lawenforcementtoday.com/grand-juries-found-to-indict-in-99-9-percent-of-cases

https://www.law.columbia.edu/news/archive/professors-fagan-and-harcourt-provide-facts-grand-jury-practice-light-ferguson-decision

Guns don’t just go off unless there’s some fault. Surely you’d have the gun examined to prove it could just discharge without pulling the trigger? And that’s something for the defence to argue.

It really does seem that being a foreigner and anti-Trump influenced things as there is clearly a case to answer.

I used to be into true crime and there were quite a few cases where the killer had previously been linked to an ‘accidental’ death and it was only when they tried to kill a second person (often in the same way) that they were charged. So for some they do seem to get away with this excuse for their first kill.

God that first article was so badly written. It was really biased making it hard to know if it is accurate and most importantly was from 2023 when Trump wasn't in power.

Trump carried that county with 54% of the vote in 2024, so this should not be surprising. and 57% Republicans registered who are the ones chosen for a grand jury by the District Attorney is a registered Republican, holding the office since 2011. In Texas, the old "key-man" system (where officials appointed friends) was supposed to be replaced by a random "wheel system" (derived from driver's license and voter registration lists), but this is Trump's America.