The former San Antonio police officer who shot an unarmed teen eating McDonald's in his car while in the restaurant's parking lot has been charged with two counts of aggravated assault by a public servant.
The department announced the charges on Tuesday, and shortly after, James Brennand, the former officer, turned himself into the department, according to Police Chief William McManus.
Brennand was fired in the days after the October 2 shooting after his body camera footage showed errors in the initial report of the incident.
McManus called the shooting "unjustified, both administratively and criminally," saying that there was "a criminal component to this, that's why we investigated as a criminal offense."
Additionally, McManus noted that Brennand received the two charges for the driver and passenger in the car. If the 17-year-old driver, Erik Cantu, does not survive his wounds, the charges could rise to homicide.
The department is working with the district attorney's office to ensure all its bases are covered. However, McManus noted that they might need more information before the case is brought before a grand jury.
"We worked on this for several days to get to this point where we could submit a warrant to a judge for signature, and that's where we are right now," McManus added.
The original report from Brennand was that he was hit by a vehicle and fired his weapon at the teen in self-defense. However, the bodycam footage never shows the car driving at the officer, only the door hitting him as it slowly rolled backward.
Since the video's release, the charges initially brought against Cantu, evading detention with a vehicle and assaulting an officer, have been dropped. The body camera footage showed Brennand firing five shots into the car and another five after the vehicle took off.
McManus shared on Tuesday that as soon as he arrived at the scene of the shooting, he recognized an issue due to where the bullet holes were located in the car.
"We have a policy that prohibits officers from shooting at vehicles, moving vehicles, except if their life is in immediate – their life or someone else's life – is in immediate danger," he said.
He continued saying he "had an issue with it right away" as he could tell which way the vehicle was moving when the shots were fired at it.
"It was very telling to me that this vehicle was moving away from the officer and moving parallel with the officer, so it was pretty clear to me at that point that we were going to have an issue," McManus said.
At the time of the incident, McManus had only been on the job for seven months, and when asked about his training, McManus shared that the training was not the issue.
"This was a failure for one individual police officer, [it] had nothing to do with our policies. Policies did not allow that, or training did not teach that," the chief said. "So this was a fail for one particular police officer."
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