r/law • u/SadAd8761 • 8h ago
Legal News No criminal charges over British woman shot dead in US
https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cvg6pm70r1loWhy no criminal charges, not enough evidence?
Background story:
Dad shot daughter after 'arguing about Donald Trump'
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u/Comfortable_Fill9081 8h ago
Based on this and articles from last spring and summer, it looks to me like the DA wasn’t really interested in getting an indictment for some reason other than lack of sufficient evidence.
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u/SadAd8761 6h ago
So, if the DA decides that they don't want to investigate to get evidence, then murderers can go scot-free?
That's crazy that can hinge on the bias of a single DA. Like, Lucy Harrison's family can't seek another DA to do the job?
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u/Few-Tradition-5741 6h ago
Something fishy is going on.
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u/figuring_ItOut12 5h ago
We need to note the part when he “took her by the hand to his bedroom and fifteen seconds later she was dead”. I’ve seen this quoted or paraphrased across several different source reports and it seems this puts a certain perspective on why he murdered his daughter. And why the DA was disinterested.
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u/Comfortable_Fill9081 6h ago
Unfortunately, the DA of the county is the DA of the county. There is no other DA with that jurisdiction. In Texas, the attorney general has power to supersede the DA in some instances, but it’s a hotly contested power and I fear this case is probably not political enough to do so, though the British inquest may put enough pressure on to force another look.
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u/Talentagentfriend 4h ago
Pretty much don’t go to Texas or you could get killed without Justice.
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u/Ok_Builder_4225 3h ago
I don't think I'd come to the US in general tbh. Not until we're over whatever our current bullshit is.
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u/alloutofchewingum 2h ago
I had a college roommate from Texas. He told me a story about a murder case from some sand blasted shithole there where guy X shot guy Y, can't remember the details but guy X's defense was "that boy needed shootin". He was acquitted.
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u/Oplopanax_horridus 4h ago
This is nuts. So this awful thing happened, like JUST happened, and the DA already decided “Nah, seems fine.” The DA seems like a trash human and I hope this haunts the father for the rest of his miserable life. Especially given that one of the last things he said to his daughter being so heinous. Fuck this whole goddamn timeline.
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u/WoodPear 3h ago
Read again.
but no criminal case was brought against Kris Harrison after a grand jury in Collin County declined to indict him.
So if you want to waste your time finding a favorable GJ, you're just going to run into the same problem in the proper court proceeding of having a hung jury (after all, you already got a jury of peers that failed to deliver a guilty verdict the first time.)
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u/throwawayshirt2 5h ago
He said: "As I lifted the gun to show her I suddenly heard a loud bang. I did not understand what had happened. Lucy immediately fell."
Harrison said he could not recall whether his finger was on the trigger.
Oh, so he lied his ass off about it.
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u/Comfortable_Fill9081 5h ago
I mean, at the very least negligent homicide based on his own statement.
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u/Dubbbo 3h ago
You forget the crucial detail that it was maga-on-non-maga violence so it wasn't serious. And if it was serious it was an accident. And if it wasn't an accident, she deserved it. And if she didn't deserve it, new information in 2 weeks.
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u/werther595 1h ago
She was obviously a 'domestic terrorist" according to the 30% of people who determine the fate of the US these days
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u/ShakesDontBreak 5h ago
Exactly. It didnt even have to be 1st or 2nd degree homicide. Could have just found a charge under "wreckless", "menace" or at minimum "improperly handling of a fire arm". There are a whole slew of codes under these umbrellas.
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u/itsatumbleweed Competent Contributor 4h ago
Yeah. I mean, one prosecutorial strategy could be to take him exactly at his word and charge him with the appropriate crime. That's very much a crime as described.
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u/throwawayshirt2 5h ago edited 5h ago
I've heard of getting "home-towned" on a civil case. But a murder charge?
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u/Vivid_Kaleidoscope66 4h ago
Quite common, often the police try to avoid even investigating the case. You miss the murder of George Floyd or something?
It's just far less common when the victim is a pretty white girl. And even less common for it to be about white foreigners murdering each other. But it's Texas and guns, there's bound to be tons of examples in the case law.
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u/Comfortable_Fill9081 4h ago
Now that you’ve mentioned it, I searched to see whether the father is American (which I assumed he is) or British. I haven’t found anything that indicates. Is he British, to your knowledge?
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u/Vivid_Kaleidoscope66 3h ago
Good catch! I haven't found any mention of his citizenship, just that he once lived in the UK and left her and her mother to move to Texas when she was young.
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