Baltimore officer ‘criminally neglected’ health of Freddie Gray, jury told

Gray's death triggered protests and rioting in the city, and helped fuel the Black Lives Matter movement.

Porter faces charges of involuntary manslaughter, second-degree assault, misconduct in office and reckless endangerment. The charges carry maximum prison terms totaling about 25 years.

Schatzow said Wednesday that the officer was present at five of six stops a transport van made after arresting Gray and could have easily pushed a button on his uniform to call for help.

Prosecutors say at one point, Porter asked Gray if he needed a medic, and Gray replied that he could not breathe and could not move from the floor of the van, where he had been placed head-first and in plastic handcuffs and leg shackles.

Instead of calling a medic, prosecutors say Porter picked Gray up from the floor and placed him in an upright position on the bench, and did not secure him in a seatbelt.

Schatzow said Gray's injury occurred in a section of the spinal cord where the nerves control the chest and the diaphragm. He said such an injury would have impacted Gray's ability to breathe.

Evidence will show that Porter "criminally neglected" his duty to keep Gray safe, the prosecutor said.

Lawyers for the defense disputed the timing of when Gray was injured.

Defense attorney Gary Proctor told jurors that Porter asked Gray if he needed medical attention at the fourth stop the van made during Gray's 45-minute journey to the police station, but decided against calling a medic because Gray "wasn't wincing."

The defense attorney says there was not one word about Gray not being able to breathe. 

A jury was seated in the case earlier Wednesday following a selection process that was relatively brisk, given defense assertions in pretrial proceedings that it would be impossible to seat an impartial panel. Judge Barry Williams repeatedly denied defense motions to move the trial out of Baltimore.

Williams questioned 150 jurors over two days, mostly out of public view, in an efficient process designed to shield their identities. Some were dismissed, leaving a smaller pool for the final selection of 12 — eight women and four men — and four alternates.

Gray, 25, died April 19 of a severe spinal injury he suffered while riding in the back of police van without a seatbelt, a violation of department policy. Porter is accused of failing to get him medical help during several stops on the 45-minute trip. Gray arrived at a police station unresponsive, was taken to a hospital and died a week later.

According to a pretrial filing by defense attorneys, Porter told investigators that arresting Gray "was always a big scene" and indicated that he knew of a previous arrest in which Gray allegedly tried to kick out the windows of a police vehicle.

"You know, so he was always, always, like, banging around," Porter said in the filing.