MILWAUKEE - An inquest jury held Friday that an off-duty police officer was justified in fatally shooting an unarmed man after a traffic confrontation in March. The advisory verdict recommended against charging the officer with a crime.
Wilbert Javier Prado, 25, an illegal Mexican immigrant living in Milwaukee was wounded eight times from behind during the incident shortly after midnight March 6, authorities said.
Officer Alfonzo Glover, 34, testified he was driving home after his shift ended around midnight when Prado began following him closely in his van and flashed his lights.
Glover, who was not in uniform, said the van kept following him, so he finally stopped his car and got out to wave the van past, but the van instead sped up, hit him and crashed into a parked car.
He said he pulled his gun and fired at Prado in his van and fired some more after Prado got out and ran to a nearby alley. A total of 19 shots were fired at Prado, testimony showed.
Glover said he believed Prado had a gun when the man extended his arm toward him. No gun was found.
The inquest jury of seven deliberated less than five hours before deciding the shooting was justified. Jurors heard four days of testimony from more than two dozen witnesses.
As the verdict is advisory, it is up to Milwaukee County District Attorney E. Michael McCann to decide whether Glover should be prosecuted for his actions.
Prado’s fiancee, Veronica Gonsalez, said when interviewed after the shooting that Prado had just obtained a new job and was planning to marry her. They had two daughters.
She said Prado came to Milwaukee from Mexico in 1999 to work, spoke little English and had no driver’s license. She said that on the night he was killed, he had gone to a friend’s home to visit others from his native Veracruz, Mexico.
An autopsy showed Prado had a blood-alcohol level of .22 percent, or almost three times the level of .08 percent considered evidence of drunken driving in Wisconsin.