GRAND JUNCTION, Colo. (AP) – An investigator says a Colorado state trooper charged with fatally shooting a suspect told him he had little training in the constitutional requirements for searches.
Ivan “Gene” Lawyer is charged with criminally negligent homicide, assault, trespass and other charges in the 2010 death of 31-year-old Jason Kemp.
Lawyer and another trooper went to Kemp’s home while investigating an accident. Authorities say Kemp wouldn’t let them in without a search warrant and struggled with the troopers at the door.
An indictment quotes Lawyer as saying he thought Kemp fired a gun at him, so he fired at Kemp.
A sheriff’s investigator testified Wednesday that Lawyer told him he had “very little if any” training on the Fourth Amendment.
