'I thought it was my apartment!': Bodycam video shown at Amber Guyger trial

The chaotic aftermath on the night a Dallas police officer fatally shot her neighbor — mistaking his apartment for hers and believing he was a burglar — was shown for the first time in court Tuesday.

Amber Guyger, who was fired after the shooting, is seen in the apartment of her neighbor, Botham Jean, briefly in one of the bodycam videos on the night of Sept. 6, 2018. Guyger was off duty but in uniform when she got home to her apartment complex, where she had moved in two months before.

“I thought it was my apartment,” Guyger is heard repeating.

When the arriving officers ask her where Jean was shot, she replies: “Top left. Top left.”

“Hey, can you hear me? Talk to me,” one responder asks of Jean. His body is seen on the floor with blood pooling around his left shoulder.

Dallas police Officer Michael Lee, whose bodycam was shown, testified at trial Tuesday that Jean still had a pulse, but was unable to communicate.

The bodycam video highlights the confusion of what happened on the night Jean, a 26-year-old accountant, was killed just before 10 p.m. while he had been unwinding alone at home. Guyger’s murder trial has riveted the city as a jarring example of how a police officer can take the life of a law-abiding citizen in the sanctity of one’s own home.

Jurors got a look inside of Jean’s apartment: It was cluttered with dishes and food left out. Light was emanating from a television and laptop. A bowl of vanilla ice cream that he had been eating was beside the laptop. Prosecutors said it smelled of marijuana, which he used for his attention deficit hyperactivity disorder.

The moment was also frantic for many of the officers who scrambled to the scene, with some unsure exactly where the apartment was at the South Side Flats, a complex about two blocks from the Dallas Police Station. Jean lived one floor above Guyger.

Guyger was not seen helping Jean after the shooting, but did call 911, a recording of which was played Tuesday and featured her saying, “I thought it was my apartment” about 19 times.

The idea that Guyger, 31, could have missed all the sensory cues and entered Jean’s apartment, then fired on him without determining she was in the wrong apartment, is at the heart of this trial, which resumed Wednesday with more testimony from investigators. The defense is arguing that while Guyger made a mistake, she did so without the criminal intent of murder, and believed she needed to defend herself because her life was in danger.

The prosecution has said that Guyger’s mistake is unreasonable, and that she failed to notice she had parked on the wrong floor of the complex’s garage, that Jean’s apartment had a red doormat outside while hers did not, and that her key fob did not work in his lock.

Lead prosecutor Jason Hermus also hammered home on Tuesday that Guyger had a choice to be more careful if she was unsure about the identity of the person inside the apartment.

source: nbcnews.com