TULSA, Okla. – Attorneys for a white Oklahoma police officer who killed an unarmed black man are asking in court records for investigators to keep as evidence a handgun that an anonymous tipster claims the man fired a day before the fatal shooting.
Tulsa police officer Betty Jo Shelby is charged with first-degree manslaughter in the Sept. 16 shooting of Terence Crutcher. Shelby shot Crutcher after arriving on a street to find Crutcher's SUV stopped in the middle of the road.
Defense lawyer Shannon McMurray says a man called claiming Crutcher was seen Sept. 15 walking down a different street and firing a gun, and that police recovered a gun left in the road.
Police declined comment Tuesday. They have said Crutcher had no gun on him or in his SUV when he was shot.
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